title: Optimizing living donor kidney graft function by donor-recipient pair selection.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  With the rising prevalence of living donor kidney transplantations (LDKT), we increasingly encounter transplant candidates who present with multiple potential living donors. For a given candidate, it can be unclear which donor offers the best opportunity for optimal posttransplant graft function. This study was undertaken to determine the relative contributions of individual donor demographic factors on graft function following LDKT.
  
  
  METHODS
  All LDKT donor-recipient pairs between January 1, 1999 and December 31, 2002 entered into the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients (SRTR) were reviewed. Suboptimal one year graft function was defined as a serum creatinine (Cr) greater than 1.5 mg/dL.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Of 20,528 adult LDKTs performed, 8,603 donor-recipient pairs had complete donor, recipient, and one year graft function data. Over one third (36%) of all LDKTs had suboptimal one year graft function. Logistic regression identified simple recipient and donor characteristics associated with suboptimal one year graft function. Four recipient factors (age, gender, race, and size), three donor factors (age, gender, and size) and recipient-donor relatedness were used to derive an equation that predicts the risk of suboptimal one year graft function posed by each potential living donor for a given transplant candidate.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In the setting of multiple potential living kidney donors, this quantitative tool may facilitate the choice of the optimal donor.
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Division of Transplantation, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94143-0780, USA.
authors.forename: Todd V
authors.initials: TV
authors.lastname: Brennan
authors.forename: Alan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bostrom
authors.forename: Sandy
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Feng
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006085:Graft Survival / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D016030:Kidney Transplantation / Q000502:physiology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D019520:Living Donors; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D018579:Patient Selection; D044469:Racial Groups; D012042:Registries; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D014481:United States