Webinar recording now available: Introduction to the Kidney Paired Donation Program
Last week's webinar on the Kidney Paired Donation (KPD) program is now up on our YouTube channel!
Kidney paired donation is a program that matches transplant candidates with suitable living donors. It gives people the chance to become a living kidney donor while ensuring that someone they want to help receives a needed kidney, even if they are not a direct match.
Canada’s Kidney Paired Donation program is run by Canadian Blood Services, working with the living kidney donation and kidney transplant programs across the country.
Topics discussed in this webinar include:
- Why would a PKD/CKD patient want to become part of the KPD program?
- How does the KPD program work?
- Am I limited to matches within my region / province, or will I be eligible for matches across the country?
- When (at which stage of kidney disease) can I become eligible for the KPD program?
- How do I become a potential kidney recipient within the KPD program?
- How do I become a potential kidney donor within the KPD program?
- Once I become enrolled in the KPD program, what does the Match Cycle process look like?
- How long will it take for me to find a match?
- Is there anything that will improve my chances of finding a match within the KPD?
- What if I am a highly sensitized patient? (And how do I know if I'm a highly sensitized patient?)
- Once a match is found, what happens then? (How long will it take before my transplant?)
About the Speakers and patient ambassadors
Darlene Jagusic is a program manager for Canadian Blood Services and leads the Kidney Paired Donation (KPD) Program and the Highly Sensitized Patient (HSP) registry. She is a critical care trained register nurse spending many years in the Intensive care units in BC and SK. She has organ and tissue experience working for the Saskatchewan provincial transplant program both as a living and deceased organ coordinator prior to her current role at CBS.
Kelly Konieczny is a PKD patient who was recently featured in news stories about the province of Alberta pausing participation in the KPD program because of surgery capacity shortage. Kelly is currently on the KPD waiting list.
Karen Murkovic is a PKD patient who found her living kidney donor through the KPD program.
Resources
Kidney Paired Donation Program
- Learn more about the program on the Canadian Blood Services site, here.
- Learn more about Highly Sensitized Patients, here.
- Learn more about how to become a living organ donor through the Kidney Paired Donation Program, here.
- Find more information about blood, organ and tissue donation on our own website, here.
Finding a living donor
- Learn about Having Your Living Donor Find YOU!, a free video series that educates patients about transplant and gives them the tools to mount a successful donor campaign, here.
Living donation peer support
- Would you appreciate some peer support as you go through your living donation journey? Learn more about the Transplant Ambassador Program, here.
Are you interested in being trained to provide one-on-one peer support to others going through the living donation process? Learn more here.
Patient stories
We have many patient stories that describe the transplant process from the PKD patient's or living donor's perspective. You can find all of our patient stories on our website here, but the following stories may be of particular interest.
- Kelly Konieczny, one of our patient presenters at this webinar, has shared her story with us before, here.
- Monique Marsh donated one of her kidneys to her sister-in-law with PKD. Read her story here.
- Marie-Pierre Schryburt received a kidney donation from her cousin. Read her story here.
- Jennifer Morgan received a kidney from her husband. Read her story here.
- Brittany Hay donated a kidney to her husband, Colin Grieve. Read their story here.