Treatments for Chronic Kidney Failure

During a transplant the patient receives a donor kidney that will cover the loss of function due to their kidney failure.

There are two types of kidney transplant depending on the origin of the donor kidney:

• Living-donor kidney transplant. In such cases the donors are usually the patient’s relatives: a spouse, parents, siblings or somebody close to the family. The advantage of this type of transplant is that it can be carried out in very advanced stages of kidney disease, maybe without even having to start dialysis.
• Deceased-donor kidney transplant. In this case the kidney is taken from a dead person and the recipient will normally be administered dialysis for a certain period, which varies according to the patient’s clinical characteristics, blood group and age, before receiving the transplant. Patients are placed on a waiting list so they may receive a kidney that best matches their characteristics as soon as one becomes available.

Chronic kidney disease patients undergo exhaustive assessments before receiving a transplant to rule out any medical conditions that would contraindicate the procedure. It is important to remember that 45 in 100 people (45%) cannot receive a kidney transplant for medical reasons.

While patients with chronic kidney disease are placed on a transplant waiting list they must decide which type of dialysis they would prefer to receive – haemodialysis or peritoneal dialysis.

Approximately 33 in every 100 people receiving dialysis are on a transplant waiting list. Of these 33 patients, about 15 will actually receive a transplant.

Kidney transplant recipients must follow a strict, lifelong treatment to prevent kidney rejection (immunosuppressive therapy) and attend regular appointments at transplant clinics to confirm the kidney is working correctly and to adjust their medication according to test results.

Transplanted kidneys do not always fulfil their function. On average, 15 years after the transplant, kidneys taken from deceased donors still work in 50 out of every 100 recipients (50%). Whereas kidneys taken from living donors are still functioning correctly at 15 years post-transplant in 60 per 100 individuals (60%). If the transplanted kidney fails, then the recipient must decide between another transplant, dialysis or conservative treatment.

ñón de un donante vivo, el riñón trasplantado funciona un promedio de 15 años. Las personas que sufren un fallo del riñón trasplantado deben decidir entre recibir otro trasplante, someterse a diálisis o a un tratamiento conservador.