Overview
Living donation occurs when a living person donates an organ to someone in need of a transplant. The Penn Transplant Institute has one of the largest and most experienced living donor transplant programs in the country.
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The continued shortage of deceased donor organs has led to living donation. Living donors are used for kidney and liver transplants. Organs from a living donor have a better chance of long-term survival than those from a deceased donor.
Penn Medicine has been performing living donor kidney transplants since the 1960s. Living donor liver transplants began as a procedure to treat children. The anatomy of the liver allows it to be divided and a portion transplanted into another individual. The liver has the unique ability to grow and regenerate after a segment is removed. Penn began performing adult-to-adult living donor liver transplants in 1999.
The Penn Transplant Institute's Living Donor program benefits donors and recipients by:
- Reducing the waiting period for a transplant.
- Reducing mortality while waiting for a transplant.
- Scheduling the procedure at a time convenient for both recipient and donor.
- Increasing the quality of the donated organ.
- Eliminating the time between procurement of the organ (time the kidney or liver is outside the body) and transplantation.