Kidney

TLDR

Kidney transplantation offers superior survival, cost, and quality‑of‑life benefits compared to dialysis, yet the waiting list for transplant candidates continues to grow, with increasing wait times and many patients removed due to death or deteriorating health. The study aims to evaluate how the new allocation system implemented in late 2014 affects transplant trends in the subsequent years. Death‑censored graft survival has improved for both living and deceased donor kidney transplants over the past decade, and the positive trends observed over the previous five years persisted through 2014.

Abstract

Kidney transplant provides significant survival, cost, and quality-of-life benefits over dialysis in patients with end-stage kidney disease, but the number of kidney transplant candidates on the waiting list continues to grow annually. By the end of 2014, nearly 100,000 adult candidates and 1500 pediatric candidates were waiting for kidney transplant. Not surprisingly, waiting times also continued to increase, along with the number of adult candidates removed from the list due to death or deteriorating medical condition. Death censored graft survival has increased after both living and deceased donor transplants over the past decade in adult recipients. The majority of the trends seen over the past 5 years continued in 2014. However, the new allocation system was implemented in late 2014, providing an opportunity to assess changes in these trends in the coming years.