Since 1989, almost 6,500 Spaniards have carried out one of the most generous acts of altruism possible. They donated a kidney or part of their liver while they were alive to make a transplant possible, an intervention that in most cases saved their lives. … of a family member or close friend.
The data, provided on National Donor Day, only includes live donations made in the last 35 years, because they are those counted and registered by the National Transplant Organization (ONT) since its foundation. However, these acts of extreme generosity are more abundant because the first kidney transplant with a living donor registered in Spain was performed at the Hospital Clínic of Barcelona in 1965.
The majority of kidney donors are women, wives, sisters or mothers, and in the case of a liver transplant the usual recipient is a child
This type of donation, despite allowing only 12% of the almost 6,000 transplants performed in Spain each year, is increasingly common, as demonstrated by the fact that it has gone from 19 donations in 2000 to 435 in 2023 (23 more times). In the last year they increased 24%. Their number may grow further if Congress approves the law being processed to guarantee that these acts have no labor or economic cost for the donor thanks to the creation of a special, 100% paid medical leave and leave that will cover from the first information to the potential donor until medical discharge after surgery.
In the case of kidney donation, practically all of those that occur, is a fundamental and growing modality because it has much better results and fewer side effects for the recipient than transplantation with an organ from a deceased person. They are also increasing because the improvement in extraction procedures, with laparoscopic (minimally invasive) surgery, is allowing average hospital stays of only four days.
The majority profile of the living kidney donor is that of a woman (70%), about 54 years old on average. In four out of ten cases it is the recipient’s romantic partner, in a quarter a brother, 17% of the time the mother and 7% the father. A child is the one who donates 3% of the time, another family member 5% and a friend 3%. In 4% of cases there is no close relationship between donor and recipient because these are so-called crossed transplants, in which someone gives their kidney to a compatible unknown third party and their relative on the waiting list, in return, ends up for receiving the organ he needs from another stranger.
In the case of the 509 donations of liver parts made by living Spaniards since the mid-nineties, the majority were primarily destined for one of their children.
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