Gig Harbor Donor Flies To Virginia To Give kidney To Navy Veteran Through Dove Program
USA: A Pierce County woman traveled to Virginia in June to donate one of her kidneys to a complete stranger, a Navy veteran named Jim Ellis, in a living transplant arranged by the nonprofit Dove. The operation created an immediate bond between donor Alicia Binger and her recipient and became a milestone for the organization that matches living donors with veterans in advanced kidney disease.
Binger, a gardener and active member of her local church in Gig Harbor, said she learned about living donation and decided to proceed after careful consideration of surgical risks and recovery. She returned to church work about a month after the procedure and described the experience with lightheartedness, even referring to the trip as a playful “kidneycation.” The donated organ was given a personal nickname, Lois, and Ellis reports steady improvements in his daily life since the transplant.
Dove’s founder, Sharon Kryer, who is herself a former kidney donor, launched the program specifically to serve veterans, citing higher rates of kidney problems among service members, including exposure-related illnesses from past conflicts. The match that brought Binger and Ellis together was facilitated through this mission; the pair now share commemorative hoodies marked with the number 58, honoring Dove’s 58th facilitated transplant.
The story underscores broader transplantation realities: roughly 100,000 people remain on the kidney transplant waiting list, living donors account for about half the number of deceased donors, and outcomes after living donation tend to show higher success rates. Medical teams praise living donors for their generosity, while Binger frames her choice as a personal decision to use a capacity she had to help another person. The transplant restored new daily normalcies for Ellis and highlighted a growing pathway for willing living donors to change lives.
