Kidney Donations Safer Than Previously Thought: Study

Kidney donations are safer now than it was previously thought with a significantly lower risk of death for donors than previously reported, according to a new study on Wednesday.
With nearly 90,000 people on the U.S. kidney transplant waiting list, the need for living donors is critical as thousands of people die each year waiting for an organ transplant.
It’s possible for living donors to give one of their two kidneys or part of a liver, the only organ that regenerates as living donor kidneys tend to last longer than those from deceased donors, and these donations can significantly reduce the waiting time for recipients. However, safety concerns and a lack of awareness have often been barriers to living donation.
In 2023, the number of living donor kidney transplants in the U.S. reached 6,290, the highest since before the pandemic. Still, this represents a small fraction of the total need. While medical bills for donors are covered by the recipient’s insurance, many donors face additional costs such as travel expenses and lost wages during recovery.
According to the study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), advancements in surgical techniques as a key reason for the increased safety.
“The last decade has become a lot more safe in the operating room for living donors,” Dr. Dorry Segev, a transplant surgeon at NYU Langone Health and co-author of the study, told the Associated Press (AP).
Newsweek reached out to Dr. Dorry Segev via email on Wednesday for comment.
The study, which tracked living kidney donations over the past 30 years, found that by 2022 fewer than 1 in 10,000 donors died within three months of the surgery. This is compared to older data that suggested a risk of 3 deaths per 10,000 donors.
According to the AP, Segev has also called for guideline updates to reflect those safety improvements, adding that he often finds transplant recipients more worried about potential risks to their donors than the would-be donors themselves.
“For them, this is even more reassuring to allow their friends or family to donate on their behalf,” Segev told the AP.
The study analyzed over 164,000 living kidney donations from 1993 to 2022, identifying just 36 post-surgical deaths. The data shows that most at-risk donors are men and those with a history of high blood pressure. However, only five deaths occurred since 2013, a period that coincides with the adoption of minimally invasive surgical techniques and improved methods for controlling bleeding.
“Over time, it’s a safe operation that’s become even safer,” which is important for would-be donors to know, Dr. Amit Tevar of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center— who wasn’t involved in the study—told the AP.
Despite the overall safety of kidney donation, there are still long-term risks to consider. Donors must be assessed for factors such as obesity, high blood pressure, smoking and family history of kidney disease, all of which can increase the risk of kidney failure later in life.
For potential donors, the decision to proceed is not taken lightly. “There’s no such thing as a moderate—or high-risk donor—either you’re perfect or you’re not,” Tevar said of the decision to accept or turn away a potential donor.