New England Donor Services Record 2025 Raises Urgency As Leaders Seek Living Kidney Donor During Donate Life Month

Brothers From Bernie And Phil’s Urge Donor Registration After Rob’s kidney And liver Transplants

USA: At Bernie and Phil’s Furniture in South Portland, community leaders, donors and recipients gathered in April for National Donate Life Month as New England Donor Services highlighted the lifesaving work of organ and tissue donation. The event centered on transplantation: company president Rob Rubin, who suffered chronic kidney disease, received both a kidney and a liver transplant on Sept. 27 last fall and has since become a vocal example of donation’s impact.

Rob’s brother, CEO Larry Rubin, who was born with a genetic kidney disease, is now publicly seeking a living kidney donor. His search underscores a critical gap in living-donor transplantation, where compatible volunteers can dramatically shorten waiting times and improve outcomes for families facing chronic organ failure.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows joined the gathering to stress donor registration as a way to enable organ and tissue procurement and transplantation in moments of crisis. New England Donor Services reported a record-breaking 2025, with more than 1,600 transplants from 640 donors, yet emphasized that demand remains high: more than 100,000 people in the United States are waiting for life-saving transplants.

Organ donation advocates at the event urged that registering — online or at local motor vehicle offices — can translate grief into hope and expand the pool of available organs for transplant. For the Rubin family and many more, one decision can change the trajectory of multiple lives.

Video originally published on 2026-04-30 20:25:59