Living-Donor Kidney Transplant

Using kidneys from living donors, UT Southwestern Medical Center’s Living-Donor Kidney Transplant Program offers transplant patients better long-term outcomes and survival rates while ensuring that donors’ health and interests are protected. 

As an academic medical center, UT Southwestern has highly trained specialists who work together to treat patients with even the most complicated cases and provide optimal outcomes. 

Advantages Over Traditional Kidney Transplantation

Patients with advanced kidney disease who are candidates for kidney transplantation – and who wish to pursue this option – may receive a compatible kidney from either a living or deceased donor.

On the whole, patients transplanted with kidneys from living donors achieve significantly better long-term outcomes and survival rates than those who receive kidneys from deceased donors.

Living donation provides many advantages over traditional deceased-donor transplantation:

• Through living donation, patients avoid the long wait times associated with transplantation from deceased donors.
• A kidney from a living donor potentially improves genetic matching, thereby decreasing the risk of organ rejection.
• The transplant surgery can be scheduled at a time convenient for both the living donor and the transplant candidate, which limits surprises and allows for advance planning.
• A transplant from a living-donor can potentially help the recipient avoid dialysis.
• Success rates improve with living-donor kidneys, which are transplanted immediately after removal and allow the transplanted organ to begin functioning in the recipient much faster.
• A living-donor kidney lasts longer than a deceased-donor kidney. 

For these reasons, our kidney transplant experts encourage kidney transplantation candidates to actively pursue living donation when possible.