Before you receive a kidney transplant, you’ll meet various members of the transplant medical team. You will then be given a list of tests to complete that will help in determining your current health status and complete your evaluation. After these tests are completed and
reviewed, your case will be presented to the Kidney Transplant Selection Committee. They determine whether transplant surgery is safe for you. They also will discuss an optimal plan of care for you after transplant.
Your transplant nurse coordinator will inform you of the committee’s decision and plan. Your coordinator will notify you if/when you are placed on the active transplantation waiting list or registry. Once you are on this list, be prepared to come to the hospital at any time of the day or night.
Kidney Transplant Wait List
The University of Colorado Hospital Transplant Program follows the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) system for prioritizing transplant candidates. UNOS is a nationwide network supervised by the federal government to help ensure that all patients receive healthy organs as soon as they become available. All transplant centers in the United States belong to UNOS.
For this system to work, it relies on organ procurement organizations, called OPOs. OPOs match and distribute donated organs, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. The OPO in our region is Donor Alliance (DA). DA is responsible for the coordination, retrieval, and distribution of organs in Colorado and Wyoming.