Transplant Center

Mayo Clinic surgeons use many innovative surgical techniques in transplant surgery and other procedures. Mayo has developed processes to increase the viability of organs for transplant, which has increased the transplant rate for patients on waiting lists.

Mayo Clinic doctors and researchers continue to study and use new surgical techniques and new pain-control options for people who have transplant surgery. During surgery, doctors may give you an incision-pain-blocking anesthetic in addition to a general anesthetic.

Surgeons have extensive experience performing living-donor transplant surgery for kidney and liver transplants. Living-donor transplantation offers you an attractive alternative to waiting for a deceased-donor organ. Mayo Clinic has one of the largest living-donor kidney transplant programs in the United States.

Also, surgeons perform minimally invasive surgery to remove a living donor's kidney (laparoscopic donor nephrectomy) for transplant, using small incisions. Laparoscopic nephrectomy typically involves less pain, a shorter hospital stay and a quicker recovery for the donor than does open surgery.

Researchers also study obesity and liver transplant. Obesity is a leading cause of liver failure. Mayo Clinic surgeons pioneered a simultaneous liver transplant and sleeve gastrectomy, a type of bariatric surgery, for people who have developed liver failure due to obesity. This additional bariatric surgery will prevent recurrent obesity and failure of the newly transplanted liver.