Your Stool Can Save Lives
OpenBiome, a nonprofit stool bank, is looking for healthy volunteers to provide life-saving treatment for people with Clostridioides difficile infections. We reimburse donors $60 per stool donation as compensation for their time and effort. A typical OpenBiome stool donor makes $250 a month.
As a stool donor, you can help fulfill an urgent public health need. Each year, half a million people in the United States contract C. difficile with 30,000 dying from the infection or related causes. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has classified C. difficile an urgent antibiotic-resistant threat to human health.
Using your stool, OpenBiome manufactures fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) preparations—a promising medical treatment for C. difficile infections. Where antibiotics fail, FMT using donor stool has resolved 80-90% of infections in randomized, controlled clinical trials.
OpenBiome’s COVID-19 Policy: During this public health emergency, doctors and patients need stool donors like you more than ever. To protect prospective donors and OpenBiome staff from COVID-19, we have implemented new safety protocols and are here to answer any questions or concerns that you may have.
Who can donate?
Donors must:
Be local to Boston, Cambridge, or Somerville, Massachusetts
Be able to travel to OpenBiome’s donation facility in Central/Kendall Square (Cambridge) and donate stool at least three times a week for 60 days.
Be between 18-50 years old during their donation period
Pass a series of health screens that includes a health questionnaire, an in-person clinical interview, and a panel of blood and stool tests
Becoming a Stool Donor:
OpenBiome rigorously screens prospective donors to ensure that they meet the qualifications for donating stool.
The slideshow below will take you through the four-step process to becoming a stool donor:
Take an online health questionnaire
Schedule a clinical interview
Attend the clinical interview
Donate stool and complete follow-up screening
How do I donate?
Donating stool is similar to donating blood but there are also some key differences: OpenBiome stool donors make onsite donation at least three times a week for 60 days. Our donation facility is located in Central/Kendall Square (Cambridge, MA). Many donors take public transportation to our facility but we also have a parking lot for those who prefer to drive.
To make sure that stool donors are healthy over the 60-day donation period, OpenBiome rigorously screens donors twice—once at the beginning and once at the end of the donation period. We also check in with donors to monitor any changes to their health each time they come in to donate stool.
Our donation and clinical appointment hours are listed below.
Donation Hours
Mon-Fri: 6:00 AM to 12:00 PM and 1:00 PM to 7:00 PM
Sat and Sun: 8:00 AM – 12:00 PM and 1:00 PM– 4:00 PM
Clinical Appointment Hours
Mon-Fri: 7:00 AM to 5:00 PM by appointment only
Sat-Sun: Closed