Canadian travelling to US to donate a kidney

[VanMan]

My younger brother is a Canadian living and working in California. He has been diagnosed with kidney disease (25% function). I offered to donate one of my kidneys and I am now having serious reservations, not so much about the surgery (although that too) but because I live in Vancouver Canada and I will have to travel to California for the transplant and my only insurance coverage will be my brother's HMO (Kaiser). My brother is uncertain about exactly what coverage I have with his HMO. Our government provided medical coverage in Canada only reimburses a small portion of US hospital expenses and nothing for voluntary medical procedures and my usual travel medical insurance provider excludes any voluntary medical procedures. It is also not clear whether my travel medical insurance will cover any portion of a trip that is considered "medical tourism" and they will almost certainly exclude any illness or complication even remotely connected to a transplant/organ donation surgery.
So far I have been unable to get an answer from Kaiser as to what exactly they will cover on my end of the surgery. I read somewhere that they are mandated to cover my pre-surgery consultation, the surgery itself and post-surgery assessment, but what about other post surgery complications such as infections, pneumonia, abdominal pain that requires hospitalization etc. If I am on the hook for an extended hospital stay that is not covered by the HMO it could bankrupt me and my spouse! Never mind just getting coverage to travel to and from California.
I can't be the first person to be in this predicament. Does anyone out there have some answers and somewhere I can go to get something in writing. This just isn't something I can do without some hard facts.
Cheers,
Mark

[Fr Pat]

     I don't have any information on this problem, but I suggest that you post also at the FaceBook page of Living Donors on Line also, because more donors check in there, including some from Canada.
           Fr. Pat
                 (kidney donor, 2002)

[CK]

I would also suggest you contact the transplant center and/or insurance company to find out the answers.

In my case, my recipient's insurance covered the cost of the donation surgery and hospitalization for me.  I had no complications, but I'm guessing that if I had any complications immediately due to surgery that required other treatment, longer than usual stay, etc, that would have been covered as well.  Once I was discharged from the hospital, my own insurance would pay for any other care needed.

I would guess that once you are discharged from the initial surgery, your own insurance would have to cover, so depending on how long you stay in the US before returning home, that's the period you need to be concerned about.  I would also find out if the refusal to cover voluntary medical procedures means they won't cover any complications from said procedures, because they might consider those two separate things. So for example, if you get an infection post-discharge and have to return to the hospital for treatment, will both the national health insurance and any travel insurance refuse to pay for that?

But again, this is all speculation and only the insurance company can give you the information you need.  The transplant center can most likely also help, since you can be sure they want to get paid so they know what is covered.