'Share a spare': Man in need of kidney hoping car signs will lead to a donor

Dan McLaughlin is taking his plea for a kidney on the road.

Diagnosed in 1994 with IgA nephropathy, also known as Berger's disease, the Riverview, N.B. man is one of thousands of people waiting for a kidney transplant in Canada.

In the hopes of finding a willing donor, he has put a sign on the back of car with his blood type and phone number.

The idea behind the "Share Your Spare" sign was to highlight the fact that everyone has two kidneys, so they could be a potential donor, he explained.

McLaughlin and his wife are in the Paired Exchange Program managed through Canadian Blood Services, which matches people from across the country for eventual donations.

But the couple have been in the program for over a year, without any luck finding a donor.

He's also on a transplant list, but hasn't been matched with a kidney yet.

So, McLaughlin has decided to take matters into his own hands.

"It's one more person taken out of the cue, so it's advantageous for everybody to try to find their own donor," he said.

Life-changing disease

Kidney failure has changed McLaughlin's life dramatically.

He has been on peritoneal dialysis for 19 months, which requires him to be hooked up to a machine every night.

This interrupts his sleep, and means he has to travel with 100 pounds of equipment wherever he goes.

"It elliminates spontaneity, and of course you don't have the energy to do anything," he said.

"I feel like I've aged 10 years in the last year."

Several calls already

But there may be hope around the corner.

Since McLaughlin put the signs on his and his wife's car, he says he's already received at least half a dozen calls from people interested in being a donor.

"It totally caught me off guard," he said Friday night, adding that he wasn't sure if the signs would work at all.

Still, he said he plans to leave the signs on his car even after he gets a transplant to get people talking about kidney disease and the need for donor.