JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A local man who’s a recipient of two organ donations is encouraging everyone to consider being an organ donor this month.
April is National Donate Life Month, a month dedicated to spreading the message of registering as an organ, eye and tissue donor.
Adolph Kosobucki explained what a jacket from the 2001 World Transplant Games, means to him.
“I was part of team USA for the 2001 World Games in Japan,” Kosobucki said.
Because he competed in that game, a writer with the Florida Times-Union wrote about him and another man from Jacksonville in this article. The article is titled “Transplanted lives lead to Transplant Games.”
“I received a kidney and a pancreas,” Kosobucki said.
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Kosobucki dealt with diabetes from childhood, had diabetic retinopathy which is an eye condition that can cause vision loss and blindness in people who have diabetes, and also began to have kidney failure — leading to those transplants nearly 28 years ago in 1996.
Since then, he’s been a huge advocate for organ donations.
According to the latest data from the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network, 46,632 organ transplants were performed from both living and deceased donors in 2023.
That’s a nearly 9% increase over 2022.
Numbers Kosobuski is proud of and said should be highlighted during this month which is meant to bring awareness to registering as an organ donor.
“When you pass you don’t need the organs anymore. So, to give the gift of life to help someone else and their quality of life, give them a second life, a second chance immeasurable,” Kosobucki said.