Surgeons complete first-ever gene-edited pig kidney transplant

Doctors say ‘the real hero’ is the 62-year-old patient from Massachusetts who underwent the experimental procedure.

The Racial Gap in Kidney Transplants Is Getting Even Bigger

Black and Hispanic patients are less likely than their white peers to receive kidney transplants from live donors, according to a new study. That’s despite efforts to eliminate racial and ethnic disparities, suggesting that new policies will be needed to eliminate the imbalance.

Home Hemodialysis Vs. Transplant: The Elephant In The Room

Folks who get transplanted are the most medically scrutinized group in nephrology. They are screened literally up one side and down the other—from dental exams to colonoscopies and everything in between. So, is it fair to say that because of a kidney transplant, they live longer? No, it’s not. This group is highly selected. And, patient selection is the elephant in the room.

How the First Successful Kidney Transplant Happened

At the time, organ transplants were rare and temporary. They were meant to help the individual until their own kidney could recover, and the body typically rejected them. But Herrick had an identical twin brother, Ronald, and a courageous medical team at what is now Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston who decided to take the risk and transplant Richard with one of Ronald’s kidneys. The surgery took about 5 hours, on Dec. 23, 1954...

How to get on the kidney transplant wait list

Like I said, Mr. Garcia was one of the lucky ones. I hope the info I share in this latest video will help you or someone you love to be lucky too.

Saying No To A Kidney Transplant

Do not misunderstand. I am ecstatic when someone I know who has a working transplant is doing well. That was the right choice for them. I support them 100% and anyone else who wants one. But there is an old saying, “Be careful what you wish for!” It would be a mistake to think that a transplant will make your life better. A kidney will not fix everything that is wrong in your life, and you may or may not return to good health. It is a gamble. A transplant is about the unknown. Be sure that you understand what the tradeoffs are, and prepare for the bad, as well as the good.

A Moral Market

Altruism exchanges could ease the desperate shortage of kidneys for transplant.

I Gave My Kidney to a Stranger to Save My Brother’s Life

How an innovative organ-donation program devised by Nobel Prize-winning economists helped four patients overcome a dire medical hurdle and survive.

Kidney Coupons Would Help People Who Need Transplants

Donate today and your loved one gets a voucher they can use later.

New Procedure Allows Kidney Transplants From Any Donor

In the anguishing wait for a new kidney, tens of thousands of patients on waiting lists may never find a match because their immune systems will reject almost any transplanted organ. Now, in a large national study that experts are calling revolutionary, researchers have found a way to get them the desperately needed procedure.

Now Streaming: How to Do a Kidney Transplant

As medical schools seek to expand their reach and capture the attentions of smartphone-prone students, class is getting increasingly virtual

Partial Picture

I want to raise my hand and interrupt Dr. W’s talk to ask—“Given that blacks only make up 13% of the population in this country, but develop end-stage kidney disease four times as often as whites, and medical reasons are most often why potential donors are excluded, and the most common causes of kidney failure run in families…what do you think a reasonable goal for living donation from blacks would be?”

Silicon Isn't Just for Computers. It Can Make a Pretty Good Kidney, Too

EVERY WEEK, TWO million people across the world will sit for hours, hooked up to a whirring, blinking, blood-cleaning dialysis machine. Their alternatives: Find a kidney transplant or die.

Study: the kidney shortage kills more than 40,000 people a year

Compensation is a controversial topic, and raises the specter of shady organ markets exploiting poor people. But there are a lot of things short of outright paying people for their kidneys that we can, and should, try.

The Disheartening Experience of Waiting for a Kidney

“If it wasn’t for my wife and my kids, I probably wouldn’t be here, I probably would have gave up,” he says in this documentary, Waiting List, which follows McCabe and his wife through the entire process of waiting and receiving a transplant. “I want to lead a normal father life, and I’m afraid that I’m not going to and that scares me a lot.”

The Twice-Transplanted Kidney

Vertis Boyce got the call from her transplant surgeon last July. We have a kidney for you, Jeffrey Veale explained on the phone, but it has an unusual backstory. The kidney was first transplanted two years ago from a 17-year-old girl into a man in his early 20s, who just unexpectedly died in a car accident. Boyce would be its second recipient. Did she want it?

The Unemployed Are Less Likely to Receive Kidney Transplants

Recent research concludes that a person with a job is 2.24 times more likely to be put on a list for a transplant than someone who is unemployed.

Why I gave my kidney to a stranger — and why you should consider doing it too

The procedure does increase your risk of kidney failure — but the average donor still has only a 1 to 2 percent chance of that happening. The vast majority of donors, 98 to 99 percent, don’t have kidney failure later on. And those who do get bumped up to the top of the waiting list due to their donation.