Living Kidney Donor Program

Considering becoming a living kidney donor?

Watch the presentation for more information about who can be a donor, the donation process, surgery and its risks, living with one kidney and recipient outcome. Contact the living donor coordinator, Jody Sawatzky, at 204-787-2400 with any questions you have about being a donor to a Manitoban in need of a kidney transplant.

Living Donor Paired Exchange

The Living Donor Paired Exchange Registry identifies potential transplant opportunities for recipients who have a willing living donor who cannot donate to them due to incompatibilities in:
- blood type
- tissue typing

You must have a living donor willing to give you a kidney to be registered in the program.

The program searches for matches amongst the incompatible pairs. When a match is found, the pairs are able to swap donors.

Exchanges can have as few as two pairs and as many as five pairs of donors and recipients. Exchanges with more than two pairs are called chains.

A chain can sometimes start with an anonymous donor who has decided they would like to donate one of their kidneys to a person in need that they don’t even know. Anonymous donors are also called Non-Directed Donors, because they do not have an individual to direct their donated kidney to.

When a chain is started with a non-directed donor, the end recipient is a person who is on the deceased donor waitlist. This person does not have a donor to enter into the paired exchange program with and would otherwise be waiting for a deceased donor kidney.

More information for patients and potential donors

Being a Living Kidney Donor Pamphlet
Social Work Services for Renal Transplant Patients & their Families

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