Kidney transplant
Surgeon James Guarrera prepares a donated harvested kidney to transplant into patient Adam Abernathy as part of a five-way organ transplant swap in New York, August 1, 2012. Abernathy's partner David Ferguson donated a kidney for transplant to a stranger while at the same time someone donated a kidney to Abernathy as part of chain of kidney donations that allowed five people to receive a transplanted kidney of a two day period. The health dangers for kidney donors is believed to be low. The risk of death from the surgery is 1 in 1,700, according to the National Kidney Foundation, and life expectancy is said to be unchanged with one kidney. Picture taken August 1, 2012. Reuters

A woman in need of a kidney found her donor on Craigslist, after posting an ad in a desperate bid to find a perfect match. Glenn Calderbank, the donor, was looking for construction materials when he ran across Nina Saria’s ad.

Nina, whose kidney failure is the result of micropolyangittis, has been waiting for a donor for more than a year without luck. Despite receiving many offers to help, including her relatives and friends, some were incompatible and some backed out.

The unorthodox plan was the idea of her husband, Kay. Lost with nowhere else to look, he decided that they might as well place an ad on Craigslist.

Calderbank felt that the screen was talking to him. Somehow, he knew that he would be the perfect match for her.

Calderbank knew what the couple was going through. On 2011, his wife died from transplant rejection. Like Nina, his wife’s kidneys were also failing. She died before they even had the chance to remove the transplanted kidney and pancreas.

"I wanted to meet them," Calderbank told NJ. "They were kind of reluctant at first, but they came over and I saw that they were two nice, clean-cut people. So I showed them my scrapbook."

"I didn't want to go because he was a stranger and I was nervous, but my husband said he had talked to him and he was very nice and we should go," Nina said.

NJ reports that Calderbank showed the couple a scrapbook containing images of what his wife had to go through. Nina wept after looking at the photos.

After undergoing through several tests to check his compatibility, the doctors approved that Calderbank was a match for Nina. The surgery is scheduled for Dec 1, 2015.

"The doctors think I'll be better once the transplant is done," she said. “I really think (Glenn) can save me and I can get my life back.”

“Glenn will be out of work for almost two months. He is a breadwinner in his family and because of me he won't be able to work,” Nina wrote on her GoFundMe campaign. As a sign of gratitude, she started a campaign to raise money to help Calderbank finance his needs during recovery.

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