Madison Burgess
We all know that donating bodily fluids like blood and bone marrow can help save the lives of others.
And it doesn't stop there, you can even donate a kidney, a piece of your liver, and certain other organs and tissues while you're still alive.
Not to mention the whole sperm donor market, where men can help single women, same-sex couples, or couples facing infertility, to have a child.
But did you know there's another lesser-known bodily matter that you can donate? If you're eating your dinner, you might want to stop reading now.
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Yes, you can actually get paid to poop - and earn a hefty sum of money for doing it.
The Telegraph reports that faeces donation is soaring in demand and could see you pocket up to £900 ($1,209) in a single month.
Essentially, scientists will collect stool samples from healthy donors and process them into capsules, which can then be taken orally to save the lives of seriously ill patients.
It's called Faecal Microbiota Transplantation (FMT), and you can think of it as someone importing their healthy gut microbiome into someone else's to help their recovery.
As outlined by the charity Guts, the health of the donors is 'monitored very carefully,' which includes testing the stool sample for harmful microbes or compounds.
You have to complete a full health questionnaire and have blood and stool samples taken for testing to ensure you're fit for the job and don't have any infections that could be passed to other people.
While it does sound disgusting, it's actually saving lives, so taking what is basically a 'poop capsule' is a small price to pay.
FMT was only introduced as a modern medical treatment in 2013 and has since been used in both the UK and the US as a treatment for persistent C. diff infections, which don't respond to antibiotics and is classed as a superbug.
Dr Elizabeth Hohmann, a Harvard-educated infectious diseases specialist, told The Telegraph that selecting donors isn't exactly an easy process.
She explained: "Donors need to have no medical history, aside from, say, a broken ankle. No antibiotics in the past year, no recent overseas travel, no history of gastrointestinal problems."
“It’s actually a lot of work for them,” she added, “We begin with a phone interview, which eliminates quite a few people who don’t meet certain criteria – if they’re healthcare workers or have recently travelled to South East Asia, for instance. Both of these things increase the chance of picking up drug-resistant gut bacteria."
Hohmann added: “Then there are physical tests, such as a rectal exam to check for bleeding or abnormalities; general medical tests and extensive blood panels; repeated Covid testing via a nasopharyngeal swab.
"Aside from the other tests, some people are put off just by the prospect of regular nose swabs.”
The scientist explained how she'll typically make 150 capsules from just one sample.
In the UK, meanwhile, Dr Benjamin Mullish told the publication that he's adamant FMT is the way forward.
"The results from the first randomised high-quality clinical trial in Amsterdam in 2013 were pretty jaw-dropping," he said, adding that there are currently trials running for conditions like liver cirrhosis and inflammatory bowel disease.
So, while admittedly it's not for everyone, if you consider yourself a healthy person and want to make some cash and help people, why not give it a go?