How do transplant lists work

Here, donor families, transplant recipients and others share inspiring stories about how donation and transplant transforms lives.

How Does Organ Donation Work? Submit Your Story. Who Can Donate? Healthcare Partners. Hospital Services Overview. Patients Resources for Transplant Patients. Writing to Donor Families. Living Donation. Donor Families Our Commitment to You. Coping With Loss. Threads of Love Memorial Quilt. Writing to a Transplant Recipient. Writing to Donor Families. Living Donation. Gift of Life Family House. Donor Families Our Commitment to You. Coping With Loss. Threads of Love Memorial Quilt.

Writing to a Transplant Recipient. Organ Procurement and Transplant Network OPTN With all of its collective efforts focused on patients, the goals of the Organ Procurement and Transplant Network are to increase the number of and access to transplants, improve survival rates after transplantation, and to promote patient safety and efficient management of the system. Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients SRTR The Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients is a trusted resource for epidemiological data and statistical analyses regarding the status of solid organ transplantation and the transplantation system in the U.

Hearts and lungs have less time to be transplanted, so we use a radius from the donor hospital instead of regions when allocating those organs. Proper organ size is critical to a successful transplant, which means that children often respond better to child-sized organs.

Although pediatric candidates have their own unique scoring system, children essentially are first in line for other children's organs. Blood type and other medical factors weigh into the allocation of every donated organ, but, other factors are unique to each organ-type.

If you have questions about your status on the list, you should ask the team at your transplant hospital. How is the right organ found for me? UNOS maintains a centralized computer network which links all organ procurement organizations OPOs and transplant centers hospitals that perform transplants and uses a complex matching system to determine organ distribution. Organ procurement organizations OPOs are responsible for recovering organs from deceased donors and getting these organs to transplant centers.

They help people express their wishes about organ donation while they are alive, speak with grieving families about organ donation, and coordinate the deceased organ donation and distribution process. They raise awareness about organ donation. Many factors contribute to whether or not an organ will be offered to you, including, but not limited to: blood type, how long you have had kidney failure, medical urgency, where you live an organ must be safely transported the distance to the transplant hospital , and in some instances your weight and size compared to that of the donor.

What is the average wait time for a kidney transplant? Once you are added to the national organ transplant waiting list, you may receive an organ fairly quickly or you may wait many years. In general, the average time frame for waiting can be years at most centers and even longer in some geographical regions of the country.

You should ask your transplant center to get a better understanding of the wait times. Why do some patients wait longer than others for a transplant? Changes to the US organ allocation system have impacted the way kidneys are allocated to patients.

These changes to the waitlist have allowed some flexibility with the factors listed above. For example, donor matching is now done to more closely match the age of the donor and recipient. This means a kidney coming from a year old donor will more likely go to someone in that age range.

This is called longevity matching. Another big change that was made has to do with patients who joined the waitlist after being on dialysis.