A proposal for an anonymous living organ donation in Germany.

Abstract In Germany, living organ donation of paired and usually not regenerating organs is restricted by law to related individuals, as well as persons who ‘obviously entertain an especially intimate personal relationship'. When this law was adopted in 1997, the intention of the legislator was to guarantee the free will of the donor and to exclude any trade of organs. Since then the transplantation of cadaveric organs has not increased. Additional organs were donated from living donors. However, for a number of reasons only a limited array of transplantation centers use living organ donation as a supply facing a steadily increasing number of patients with chronic renal failure. Living orga…