With more than 100,000 people across the country waiting for a kidney transplant, living kidney donors can offer them a second chance at living their healthiest life possible.
Our living donor program is committed to helping patients achieve transplant while maintaining the highest standards of health and safety for donors and recipients. Since the living kidney donor program started in 1983, we’ve performed more than 1,300 living donor transplants and more than 3,000 total kidney transplants.
Intermountain works with the National Kidney Registry to offer paired donation for both incompatible pairs and compatible pairs in order to provide the best match and better outcomes for donors and recipients.
Through innovative thinking and a team of dedicated caregivers focused on kidney donors and recipients, we’re able to provide care for patients across the Intermountain West.
A Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department officer saved another officer’s life by donating a kidney.
Son donates kidney to speed up transplant process for his father.
What will my donation journey be like?
Getting started (takes 2-3 days)
First, fill out a questionnaire online to assess your health. Then, a physician will review your questionnaire
Learning more about you (takes 2-3 weeks)
After your questionnaire is reviewed, we will reach out to learn more about you. This will include filling out the Living Donor Records Worksheet, and having a phone call with a donor advocate and a nurse coordinator. We will also ask for a cheek swab at home or clinic to figure out your donation pathway, whether it be directly to your recipient, or through a paired donation.
Evaluation in a transplant clinic (about 2 weeks)
Next, you will come into the Transplant Clinic to get an evaluation, which usually takes a full day. This evaluation will include having any extra tests done, or consulting with more transplant team members as needed. Your results and evaluations will be reviewed for approval by the transplant team.
Donation (time may vary)
Once we get approval from the transplant team, we will help you schedule your transplant surgery. You will come into the clinic for a checkup before your surgery, and then have your kidney surgery as scheduled.
Follow-up (two years)
After your surgery, you will come back to the clinic for a checkup to make sure you’re healing well, and you aren’t experiencing any issues after your surgery. You will then be asked to follow-up with the transplant team three more times. The first will be six months after your surgery, then at the one-year mark, and finally at the two-year post-op mark
The first thing we think about when choosing a living kidney donor is long-term health and keeping you safe. This means we need to test your general health and kidney function to figure out if you’re a good fit.
A donor can expect to have a blood test and a urine test to check for anything out of the ordinary. You will also need to get an EKG to check your heart health, an x-ray to check your lungs, and a CT scan to check for things like kidney size, shape, or tumors. Routine age-appropriate cancer screenings need to be up to date, too. Extra testing may be needed based on your unique circumstances.
The path to become a living kidney donor is made up of three parts: evaluation, surgery, and follow-up.
Evaluation, in most cases, can be done on a single day in our transplant clinic. It may take two to three weeks to go over your results and get approval to donate. Once approved, surgery can move forward based on availability.
The timeframe may be extended if unexpected health issues come up or if the recipient is not a direct match for your organ.
Lab tests help us figure out if your blood group and tissue type are a match. For kidney donors who are not a match, you can still make it possible for your recipient to get a living donor kidney through paired donation.
Kidney paired donation is a transplant option for candidates who have a living donor that is medically able to donate their kidney, but may not be the best match for the person they we supposed to donate their kidney to in the first place.
The National Kidney Registry organizes a list of other kidney donor and recipient pairs to get better matches for everyone throughout the group.
While every situation can be different, most kidney donors should plan to take three to six weeks off work for surgery and recovery time. Physically demanding jobs may require you to take eight weeks off work. During recovery, you should avoid lifting anything over 10 to 15 pounds, and we recommend going on walks for exercise.
Kidney donors can go back to their normal routine after eight weeks, but it may take time for your energy levels to go back to what they were. Physically active communities of living kidney donors are proof of how good the outcomes can be for donors.
Expenses related to kidney donor testing, surgery, and follow-up are covered by the recipient's health care insurance and are not billed to the kidney donor. However, kidney donors may experience indirect costs such as travel, housing, and lost wages.
You can get help with those costs through the National Living Donor Assistance Center and the National Kidney Registry's Donor Shield program.
We also encourage you to look through other resources, including more about the financial and medical impacts of living kidney donation, at the American Society of Transplantation Living Donor Toolkit.
There are two options for donors.
Option 1: A kidney donor can travel to Intermountain Medical Center in Murray, Utah for evaluation and surgery. Kidney donors who come to Intermountain Medical Center for surgery will need to stay in the Salt Lake City area for one to two weeks, or until they are cleared by the surgical team to go home. If you are planning a trip, please contact us at (801) 507-6333 for a list of hotels with discounted rates and to apply for financial help.
Option 2: A kidney donor may be referred to a transplant program closer to where they live through the National Kidney Registry’s Remote Donation Network. Remote donation lets the donor recover at home while their kidney is shipped to the recipient's transplant center.