Living-Donor Kidney Transplantation

Living-donor kidney transplantation allows an individual to donate one of their two healthy kidneys to someone whose kidneys have failed. It is an altruistic act on the part of the donor. In fact, aside from being medically cleared, a living donor’s sole reason for donating his or her kidney must be an unselfish wish to help the recipient. Most often, a living donor is a blood relative or personal acquaintance of the recipient.

The Thomas E. Starzl Transplantation Institute’s Kidney/Pancreas Transplantation Program is among the nation’s most active, and has become the largest for living-donor kidney transplantation in the northeastern United States. Since 2002, more than 600 living-donor kidney transplants have been performed at UPMC.

The advances in surgery and care that now allow friends and relatives to donate one of their kidneys are helping to overcome the organ donor shortage and save lives. In recent years, more patients have received kidneys from living donors in the United States than deceased donors.

Currently, more than 79,000 people are waiting for a kidney transplant in the United States. In addition to helping to close the gap between the number of patients awaiting a kidney transplant and the number of kidneys available, living donation offers several other advantages:

■Shorter wait times for suitable organs
Once a living donor has been identified, the removal of the donor kidney and transplantation into the recipient can be planned and performed electively. Recipients avoid the wait times associated with receiving a kidney from a deceased donor.
■Healthier recipients
Because the wait time is shorter, recipients may receive a transplant while they are still in relatively good health and before their kidney disease reaches severely advanced stages.
■Increased chance for successful outcome
Healthier recipients have a better chance at a successful transplant outcome. One year after transplantation, more than 98 percent of UPMC’s living-donor recipients are still alive.
(Statistic source: Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients, www.ustransplant.org)