Did you know?
Published 5:00 pm Saturday, February 5, 2022
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The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases reports that chronic kidney disease (CKD) affects more than 37 million Americans, or roughly one in seven adults in the United States. Approximately one-third of individuals in the U.S. with diabetes also have kidney disease. In addition, roughly one in five adults with high blood pressure have kidney disease. Kidney transplants save lives every day, and the U.S. Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network indicates nearly 23,000 kidney transplants were completed in 2020. However, Americans with kidney disease may need to wait a significant period of time before they can receive a transplant. The United States Renal Data System 2020 Annual Data Report indicated that the median wait time for a kidney transplant for individuals with end-stage kidney disease is 49.2 months. That wait time can be traced to various factors, including a shortage of organ donors and the amount of people currently on the wait list, which the USOPTN indicates included more than 90,000 people as of August 2021.