Larry William Swilling walks the streets of Anderson, S.C., with a sandwich board over his stocky shoulders.

"NEED KIDNEY 4 WIFE," the sign reads.

He and Jimmy Sue Swilling have been married for 55 years. She was born with only one kidney and after years of kidney disease, that organ has started to fail. No one in the family is a match for a transplant.

Swilling, 77, has collected six pages of names of strangers who offered to be tested as potential kidney donors for his wife.

"I never would have thought that I'd have got this much response to it," Swilling told CNN affiliate WYFF with tears in his eyes. "I'm amazed by it and I'm so thankful."

Approximately 92,000 people are on the waiting list for kidney transplants in the United States, according to the National Kidney Foundation. Last year, 4,903 of them died waiting.

The United Network for Organ Sharing manages the U.S. transplant system under a contract with the federal government. The kidney is one of the most needed and most transplanted organs, said UNOS spokesman Joel Newman; it's not uncommon for patients to wait three to five years for a deceased donor's organ.

That's why many patients reach out to family or friends for help in finding a living match.

Swilling is not the first person to go public to find an organ donor. In 2004, cancer patient Todd Krampitz advertised on highway billboards for a new liver and was successfully matched. Earlier this year, 21-year-old Hannah Craig found a kidney donor on Facebook. Even a member of Anderson Cooper's team has asked the show's audience for help.

There's been an uptick in recent years of altruistic donors, says Dr. Brian Becker, a transplant physician and former president of the National Kidney Foundation.