Our mission at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian Kidney and Pancreas Transplant Program is to maximize transplantation opportunities for all patients seeking our care and expertise. We are committed to delivering life-enhancing transplant services with compassion for each patient. Our patient's health and safety have and always will be our priority. |
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Our participation in the OPTN Organ Offer Acceptance Collaborative |
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The processes involved in accepting deceased donor organ offers for patients on the waiting list are integral to the transplant system and saving lives. However, since organ offer acceptance rates vary across the United States, offer acceptance is a key area for improvement. Our program has been focusing on this area for several years, and we are excited to participate in the collaborative to share our experience and learn from others’ experiences. To learn more, click here.
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Meet Transplant Nurse: Darbie Roth |
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Please tell us a little bit about yourself:
I grew up on a farm in rural Mississippi. My first degree was in Music Education and Musical Theatre. I spent twenty years traveling and performing in many countries with diverse cultures. I have always loved the way that music brings people together. I began my second career in nursing, which has brought me into a field of ongoing caring and compassion. I received my nursing degree from Long Island University and have worked on the transplant unit for four years.
What is the most rewarding part of being a transplant nurse?
The team I work with, the patients I care for, and watching our patients go home healthy. Our team is profoundly united and supportive, and we never give up.
What is the most challenging part of being a transplant nurse?
Just grasping the knowledge. I realize that I will never stop learning in nursing, which is highly challenging and rewarding.
What myths about transplant would you like to dispel?
That there are enough organs for people who need them and that only someone who has died can donate them. It’s simply not true!
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Where do you see yourself in five years?
I am a senior nurse with genuine compassion, laughter (even through tears), and empathy for my patients and colleagues. I hope never to stop learning and that I continue to grow. I love music, nursing, and all the memories that encompass a lifetime.
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Altruistic Kidney Donor: Jacob Mountain |
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Last year on my birthday, I donated my kidney to a stranger. It is the most consequential thing I have ever done.
I learned about non-directed kidney donation in college. The utilitarian calculus seemed almost too good to be true: suffer a minor inconvenience to extend another person's life by a decade or more. So I added it to my index of beliefs, talked about it in the dorm common room, and then forgot about kidney donation entirely for a few years.
In January 2021, two weeks after I graduated college, I read a post memorializing the late Tommy Raskin. Tommy was an effective altruist. He was my age. We shared the same ideals, but Tommy "lived as though the truth were true." I was preoccupied, content to set aside my beliefs for the more immediate concerns of everyday life. The news of his suicide shocked me out of my moral torpor. I resolved to stop intellectualizing my values and start living them. I began the process of donating my kidney the next day.
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Eight months later, I was on the operating table. To get there, I attended hospital appointments, provided half a dozen bloodwork and urine samples, and eventually convinced my loved ones that I wasn’t crazy. Electing to have the procedure done on my birthday probably didn’t help my case.
My donation is not important because it was hard—it was easy. I have a harder time eating vegan each week. It’s not important because it was the act of a saint—like I said, it was easy, and saints do hard things. It’s important because it was necessary. If I didn’t do it, a human being would’ve died 15 years too early—and like Peter Singer so powerfully demonstrates with his parable of the drowning child, it doesn’t matter how far away the person in danger is: when inaction means death, one must act.
My donation has profoundly shaped my self-conception. Philosopher Tobias Rees asked a question in a talk I watched recently: “What would it mean to think about oneself, experience oneself . . . in terms of the borrowed life?” My life is borrowed from my family, my community, the bacteria in my body, and the algae in the sea. Life conceptualized this way is burdened by an unpayable debt but elevated by boundless gratitude. Through my donation, I vividly experienced both.
I continue my work in this domain by educating others on kidney donation. I share my reasoning with friends. I’ve presented to coworkers about the donation process and advocated for improvements to my company’s donor leave policy. Kidney donation was one part of an ongoing effort to act in accordance with my beliefs. This is my most important work to date, and it is the work of a lifetime.
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Voices In Transplantation: Charlie Allenson |
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Our 'Voices in Transplantation at Weill Cornell Medicine' series is back! Charlie shares his experience finding a living donor, getting the word out, and what life is like for a transplant recipient. We hope this video will help encourage and inspire patients on a similar transplant journey. Click the image below to watch. |
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Do you want to participate in our 'Voices In Transplantation' series?
If so, please email elb9128@nyp.org to learn more.
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Upcoming Events for Our Transplant Community:
Support Group: Mar 8, 2023, 10:00 AM
Conversations with Cornell Kidney Webinar: March 28th and 29th, 11:00 AM
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1283 York Ave, Floor 9
New York, NY 10065
P: (212) 746-3099 | F: (212) 746-3100 |
E: transplant@med.cornell.edu
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