Warning Regarding Obese Kidney Donors

LETTERS Kidney Warning (1 Letter) Published: August 13, 2012 To the Editor: Re “Transplant Centers Struggle With Donors’ Obesity” (Aug. 7): The concern for possible kidney failure in obese living kidney donors is not without justification. In 2010, Dr. Stephen Bartlett and his colleagues at University of Maryland published in the journal Transplantation their findings of follow-up of obese donors at an average of seven years after surgery. They found that kidney function in almost half had dropped to less than 60 milliliters per minute, considered Stage 3 chronic renal disease. (Stage 5 requires dialysis.) Unfortunately, as the article reported, only 10 percent of transplant centers exclude living donors who are obese, and about half of transplant centers accept living donors who are morbidly obese, subjecting these individuals to additional risks of hypertension, kidney failure and even death. Jim Bowman, M.D. Rockville, Md.