I am advised by the HSE that the ‘work up’ of patients for the live donor programme involves clinical assessment of both recipients and potential donors. Clinical criteria are defined for all renal patients to be placed on the renal transplant list. Pre-emptive live donor transplantation is a possibility for patients; however, this number is not possible to define as while some patients may be pre-emptive at initial stages of work up, the process and time to completion of work-up may require patients to commence other forms of renal replacement therapy prior to transplantation. The HSE have advised that they do not monitor the private or public status of any of the patients as it is not relevant to either the live donor work-up or transplant operation date.
Members of the National Renal Transplant Programme as well as members of the senior management team at Beaumont Hospital are actively working with the Department of Health, the HSE and the National Transplant Office to increase the rate of kidney transplantation by ensuring that the appropriate resources are in place to do so. Approximately 30 live donors will be performed in 2012 and Beaumont Hospital have developed plans and outlined resources to increase this to 100 live donor transplants per annum.
