Celebrate the gift of life

Please help us to celebrate Organ Donation Week, taking place between 26 September and 3 October. There’s plenty to celebrate: more than 50,000 people are alive today due to the incredible gift of organ donation. One of those people is Katrina, who suffered sudden and unexplained kidney failure that led to her needing a life-saving transplant. She remembers a particularly poignant moment in hospital, after receiving her call for the transplant.

"I was talking to the nurse, and I turned just as the kidney went past. I burst into tears because up until then it was still hypothetical. I was so overwhelmed and felt very emotional; very mixed emotions of gratitude and sadness for the donor’s family."

(Picture: Katrina with her daughter)

Since receiving her transplant, Katrina has become a mum to her 'miracle baby' – a daughter she thought she could never have.

She says, "I want to live the best and fullest life I can and for me that includes having a family. My donor couldn’t have a family and in a way it’s honouring him too. I’m so thankful to my donor and his family."

As part of Organ Donation Week, we’re asking people to make sure they’ve registered with the NHS Organ Donor Register and to discuss their choices with their family, so that they are prepared to support it. In addition, we would love people to share our content online to help dispel some of the common myths around about organ donation and shed more light on this life-saving procedure.

To raise awareness, we’re asking people to go pink! You can wear pink, bake pink, drink pink…change your social media profile to pink, light up pink, encourage your children to wear pink, paint something pink, the pinkibilities are endless!

The aim is to go as pink as possible, to help people really see the support for organ donation around the country and to find out more about it. We will be encouraging people to chat about organ donation with their family, friends and colleagues during the campaign too.

Follow us on social media @nhsorgandonor. If you share any photos, please use the #organdonation #organdonationweek tags and mention us so we can share your pictures. The more people use the same hashtags, the bigger the noise will be.

Thank you in advance for helping us to raise the roof about organ donation - we can’t wait to see what you all get up to!