News & Events

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Making Headlines

Hopkins doctors remove donor kidney through patient's vagina

By Sara Michael
Examiner Staff Writer 2/3/09
Johns Hopkins doctors have performed what they believe is the first-ever surgery to remove a healthy donor kidney through a small incision in the back of the patient's vagina.

The patient had less pain and a shorter recovery time -- benefits that could encourage more kidney donations, doctors said.

END THE WAIT!

A Multi-Faceted Collaborative Initiative to End the Wait for a Kidney Transplant in the U.S. in 10 Years

There is on an ongoing and urgent need to increase the number of organs available for transplantation in the United States. To address this complex problem, the National Kidney Foundation has developed a comprehensive action plan to increase the number of transplants for kidney patients-and to End the Wait! Click here for more information and to view the recommendations, many of which relate to care and follow-up of living donors and potential donors.

Save the Date!

11th National Donor Recognition Ceremony and Workshop July 17-19, 2009 Omni Shoreham, Washington, D.C.

The 11th National Donor Recognition Ceremony and Workshop (NDRCW) will take place July 17-19, 2009 at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C. The NDRCW is the Federal government's biennial event that takes place in the nation's capital and pays tribute to all Americans who have donated organs, tissues, or marrow to save or enhance the lives of others.

Living Donor Follow-Up Clinic

The University of Maryland Medical Center (UMMC) has established "one of the first follow-up clinics in the nation to promote the lifelong physical and mental health and wellness" of living donors. According to UNOS Update (September-October 2008), "The clinic was the vision of UMMC associate professor and transplant surgeon Matthew Cooper, M.D. Dr. Cooper, a living-donor kidney transplant surgeon-and chair of the OPTN/UNOS living donor committee-was involved in the committee's examination of living-donor follow-up at transplant centers across the country."

"The results of the committee's examinations revealed uneven follow-up, and he and the committee became aware of the need for enhanced long-term care of these magnanimous donors. Dr. Cooper also saw that living-donor follow-up at his own transplant center could be improved, and he challenged the institution to make improvements. UMMC and its Division of Transplantation agreed, and the medical center has supported establishment of the clinic all along the way...."

NLDAC Celebrates First Year
Living donors, recipients nationwide are grateful for the assistance

When the National Living Donor Assistance Center (NLDAC) opened last year on Oct. 17, project director Akinlolu Ojo M.D., Ph.D., hoped that the new program would be embraced by transplant centers. His hopes were realized as transplant centers soon began registering their living donor programs, and applications came streaming in.

Livingdonors.org #1 source for Information on Living Kidney Donation
More Web users turn to the National Kidney Foundation than any other source

The National Kidney Foundation has the most popular and comprehensive Web site about living kidney donation, according to a recent report in Kidney International. Livingdonors.org was ranked as the #1 site in terms of coverage, accuracy, and quality.

The study's researchers identified Web sites that provide information about living kidney donation by plugging keywords into search engines, then narrowed the analysis to 86 sites. They assessed which Web sites were visited most frequently, and asked two reviewers to independently review the quality of the information on each site.

Book Reviews

Giving Life By: Tom Falsey
As someone who is passionate about organ donation awareness, Tom Falsey has gone beyond being a living kidney donor, beyond being a long term blood donor and bone marrow registrant, beyond active leadership with many local and national organizations and compiled not only his own and his family's inspiring stories, but also collected another 26 amazing stories (28 in all) into this book. Covering the full range of living and deceased organ donation of every type, he connects the stories of many recipients to their corresponding donor story, providing the full picture of this life saving process.

CLEVELAND CLINIC FIRST TO PERFORM SUCCESSFUL LIVE KIDNEY DONATION THROUGH SINGLE BELLY BUTTON INCISION
Urologists Develop Scar-less Kidney Removal, New Procedure Holds the Potential to Increase Living Donations for Recipients in Need

Thursday, July 17, 2008, Cleveland: Family, friends and even altruistic strangers willing to donate a kidney now have a less invasive surgical option, called single-port trans-umbilical live donor nephrectomy.

The procedure, which entails removing a kidney via the belly button, has resulted in excellent kidney function in the recipient, according to Cleveland Clinic surgeons who will publish their findings in the August issue of the Journal of Urology. The new minimally invasive surgical alternative could benefit many of the more than 75,000 patients currently in need of a kidney in the United States.

National Donor Recognition Ceremony and Workshop (NDRCW)
July 20-22, 2007, Washington, DC

The 2007 National Donor Recognition Ceremony and Workshop (NDRCW), the 10th Federal Government ceremony to honor the Nation’s living and deceased donors, took place in Washington, DC on July 20-22, 2007.

This event was sponsored by the Division of Transplantation, Health Resources and Services Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services with the assistance of the National Kidney Foundation’s (NKF) National Donor Family Council and many other transplant associations and organizations.

Saturday’s program included a plenary session, workshops and sharing sessions for living organ and marrow donors, organ and tissue donor families, and donation professionals. The Sunday recognition ceremony featured special presentations and tributes in honor of the generosity of America’s heroes – living organ and marrow donors as well as those who donated organs and/or tissues after death. Among the recipient speakers on Sunday sharing their story of receiving the gift of life, were a cord blood recipient, kidney-pancreas recipient, and a cornea recipient. A special video tribute was shown, with names and photos of loved ones who donated organs and/or tissues after death as well as living donors.

The NDRCW is held every other year, and all the Nation’s living donors, donor families and friends are invited to attend. There is no cost for registration or for attending the Saturday workshops or Sunday’s ceremony. Individuals or sponsoring organizations are responsible for costs such as housing, travel, meals and incidentals. In 2007, over 400 people attended the NDRCW, including donor families, living donors, transplant recipients, donation professionals, families, and friends.

For more information about the activities that took place at the 2007 National Donor Recognition Ceremony and Workshop, please contact the Division of Transplantation at 301-443-7577, visit www.organdonor.gov or call the National Donor Family Council at 800-622-9010 or email us at donorfamily@kidney.org. Please stay tuned to www.donorfamily.org for information on upcoming events.

Transplant first gives hope to many
A young Melbourne tiler, Davorin Gelemanovic, faced a grim future last year. Suffering severe kidney failure, his hopes for a transplant were dashed when he found out his mother, who shares the same blood group, was unfit to donate a kidney. His father has a different blood group and was deemed incompatible.

Lotsa Helping Hands:
The National Kidney Foundation’s (NKF) "People Like Us" initiative, a growing movement to empower, educate and enable people with chronic kidney disease (CKD), transplant recipients, donors and family members, has partnered with Lotsa Helping Hands to provide an online resource for its many care givers.

Lotsa Helping Hands is a simple, immediate way for friends, family, colleagues and neighbors to assist loved ones in need. It is an easy-to-use, private group online calendar, specifically designed for organizing helpers, where everyone can pitch in with meals delivery, rides, and other necessary tasks. There is no cost to your family to use this system. For more information on how this site works visit or to set up an account visit: www.kidney.lotsahelpinghands.com

Transplant Organizations Request Funding to Boost Organ Donation
April 14, 2005 -- Transplant surgeon Dr. Ginny Bumgardner and pediatric resident Dr. Trent Tipple presented testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies today to request $25 million in funding for the Organ Donation and Recovery Improvement Act of 2004.

New Zealand Investigates Paying Live Donors "Income Support"
The New Zealand Health Ministry is investigating a plan to pay live organ donors up to eight weeks of welfare assistance to aid in their recuperation. Up to 350 New Zealanders are on the waiting list for an organ transplant. The New Zealand Kidney Foundation hopes the government will implement a payment scheme, similar to maternity leave, where the employee would be paid 80% of their income. It costs up to $60,000 a year to keep someone alive on dialysis, which is funded by district health boards, while a transplant patient's medication and follow-up care costs were only about $11,000 annually. (From Transplant Chronicles*, Vol. 12, No. 1)

A New Georgia Law Compensates Living Organ Donors
An Atlanta resident and mother of two, Elizabeth Moore knew that something was not quite right with her six-month-old daughter, Helen. She had problems eating and showed delays in her development. After several visits to the doctor, Helen was diagnosed with kidney failure.

Organ Donation/Assistance for Living Donors
President Bush signed H.R. 3926, the Organ Donation & Recovery Improvement Act, on April 5, 2004 (Public Law 108-216). The National Kidney Foundation (NKF) worked with the sponsors to help craft the final bill.

Diabetes and Transplantation Task Force
On May 7 to 8, 2003, more than 60 physicians, surgeons, nurses and allied health professionals met in Chicago, IL, to discuss state-of-the-art approaches to transplantation in the clinical management of patients with diabetes and advanced chronic kidney disease. Four workgroups addressed pretransplantation evaluation and management, therapeutic alternatives for treatment of patients with chronic kidney disease, posttransplantation diabetes mellitus, and improving long-term kidney transplant outcomes in patients with diabetes. This report summarizes the deliberations and recommendations of the task force.

Recommendations from the National Conference on the Wait List for Kidney Transplantation (7/03)
In March 2002, over 100 members of the transplant community met in Philadelphia for a meeting designed to address problems associated with the growing number of patients seeking kidney transplantation and added to the waiting list each year. Recommendations from the conference were published in the most recent issue of the American Journal of Transplantation. For a copy of the article, please contact livingdonors@kidney.org with your request.

Visit the National Kidney Foundation Newsroom for additional articles on organ and tissue donation.

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