Promoting Utilization of Kidneys by Improving Patient Level Decision Making

The transplantation system in the United States discards hundreds of recovered kidneys annually. Many of the discarded organs are of marginal quality and are believed to confer smaller survival gains than other procured organs. Previous studies have established that these marginal organs offer societal benefit with respect to remaining on dialysis, but neglect quantification of transplant benefit to an individual patient. The proposed research aims to develop a decision-rule that aids clinicians in determining when it is appropriate to accept such organs for transplant in a patient.