By the time Vicky Yan* reached age 13, her kidneys had lost 90 percent of their function.

The UW sophomore, who was born with chronic renal kidney failure, soon began dialysis, a process that helps replace kidney function through waste and fluid removal. After a series of blood tests and other procedures, Yan found that none of her family members’ kidneys were ideal matches for her. When she was 15, her name was added to an organ waiting list — and she waited anxiously.

“That’s a reality for, I imagine, thousands of patients a day,” Yan said. “What people don’t realize is while they’re waiting, they’re actively fighting.”

Yan fought via dialysis while living mostly like any other teenager for about two years. Finally, just two months shy of her 17th birthday, the Mill Creek native’s transplant pager, which was provided for her by Seattle Children’s Hospital and Regional Medical Center to alert her of a match, buzzed at 3:30 a.m.

“I remember receiving that phone call and thinking ‘This is a dream, I’m sure,’” Yan said.

Her parents immediately rushed her to the hospital. After her final dialysis treatment to clean out her body, the 16-year-old went under the knife for eight hours to receive one fully functioning kidney.

“A lot of people tell me getting a transplant is like being reborn, and it absolutely was that for me,” Yan said.

For many at the UW, however, it’s just a small, red heart in the corner of a driver’s license. But members of Students for Organ Donation at the UW and University Health Education Leadership Program (UHELP) consider it a life-saving process that all young people should be aware of.

These students are making organ donation a prominent campus issue this month. As National Donate Life Month, April has inspired increased efforts to educate the campus community about a process that is often masked by misconception.

“It seems morbid to talk about it, but it really saves lives,” senior Amy Kilian said. “The whole process is not well understood.”

Kilian founded the Students for Organ Donation chapter at the UW last quarter with the goal of educating the campus community. The pre-med student, who is a registered organ donor, sees the cause as a way she can help save lives at this point in her life.

“I think it’s important we talk and think about this because it’s not something that’s on our minds, but ultimately, most donors are younger,” Kilian said. “It sounds awful to say that, but unfortunately, it’s true.”

Though anyone can be a potential donor regardless of age, race or medical history, organs from a younger donor can be more successful.

The process differs for solid organ transplants, which include lungs, kidneys, hearts, and cell organ transplants, such as bone marrow. Most solid transplants must come from a deceased donor, but kidneys and segments of a lung lobe or pancreas, for example, may come from a living donor. Bone marrow donations usually come from a living person.

The main factors considered in matching a donor and recipient are blood type, size of organ and function of organ at the time of donation. An organ from a brain-dead donor, for example, may not function as well because of the impact this instability can have on the organ.

Like any surgical procedure, complications can occur with transplantation, said. Dr. Jorge Reyes, a transplant surgery professor and chief of transplant surgery at Seattle Children’s Hospital. Yan, for example, knew a kidney recipient whose organ failed a few months after receiving it. He soon went back on dialysis — and on the organ waiting list.

Yan said she’s particularly conscious of her health now, though she doesn’t constantly stress about her kidney failing.

The need has grown for some organs, particularly kidneys, Reyes said, because of smoking, obesity and other problems of today’s lifestyle. For adults, the need for transplantation is often the result of acquired diseases or tumors, while a child’s necessity is usually due to an inherited disorder.

More than 98,000 people are in need of an organ transplant. Each day, about 77 people receive the organ they need and up to 19 die while waiting, according to OrganDonor.gov, a U.S. Government informational Web site.

Though organ donation is different from other causes, such as war and genocide, that often rally students, Yan thinks it’s just as important.

“That little act of signing up doesn’t seem like a lot — but it is,” she said.

For Reyes, young people play a significant role in organ donation, whether they know it or not.

“It’s a social problem, not just a medical problem; the potential impact on society could be tremendous.” Reyes said. “Perhaps that youth and energy of college students will bring us back to younger days of doing something to help other people, [and] not because we’re getting something out of it.”