Since the very first transplant, a living donor kidney transplant between identical twins in 1954, the gift of an organ or part of an organ by one living person to another has been a key part of the development of this life-transforming medical specialty.

In the early years, living transplants from one twin to another, or a parent to a child, offered the best hope that recipient's body would not reject its new organ. But with advent of the era of powerful immunosuppressive drugs, surgeons increasingly came to use organs from cadavers.

By 1990, almost 13,000 of the 14,930 transplants performed that year used cadaver organs. But in the late 1990s, as the lists of patients needing transplants lengthened and the waiting time for life-saving organs grew longer, renewed interest began to focus on living donor transplants.

One factor was the increased use by medical centers of laparoscopic surgery to remove a kidney from the donor -- a technique that has greatly shortened the recovery period. Partly as a result of this, the number of living kidney donors in the year 2000 climbed to more than 5,000, and living kidney transplants may soon exceed the number from cadavers.

Also fueling interest was the growth in living-donor liver transplants -- a riskier operation where a donor allows part of his or her liver to be removed, and transplanted to the patient. Both the donor and recipient liver portions regenerate in a matter of weeks. Where in 1990 there were only 14 living donor liver transplants, all to children, in the year 2000 more than 340 living donor liver transplants were performed in the United States.

This surge in living donor transplants, however, has created differences of opinion among transplant professionals. Some surgeons have expressed concerns about the risks to liver donors. And a growing ethical debate has developed over whether people should be allowed to donate organs to strangers anonymously.

The guide presented in this section of Transplant Week is intended to serve as a primer for anyone considering whether living donation -- either as a recipient, or as a potential donor -- is the right course for you.

As with all information provided in this site, it is offered for educational purposes only, and it is not intended nor implied to be a substitute for professional medical advice. Always consult your own physician or healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.