Julie Wolf, the 62-year-old director of a charity in Olean, needed a new kidney.
Linda Padilla, the 61-year-old postmaster of Ellicottville, wanted to donate a kidney.
The two met on the Internet on a web site that pairs strangers with patients who need
organs.
They ended up best friends, as well as neighbors, after completing a successful transplant
in Buffalo.
"I've been given a new life. It's awesome," said Wolf, who has been on dialysis for four
years.
Their meeting marks the first successful match at www.wnykidneyconnection.org, which may be the first regional website of its kind in the nation.
But the practice of soliciting living donors over the Internet remains controversial.
… Henry L. Davis
