The province has set a new record for the number of kidney transplants it completed last year, after provincial numbers fell short during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2023, 83 Manitobans received kidney transplant surgery, quashing the province’s 2017 record of 77, the province announced on Monday.
“Donating an organ is one of the most selfless acts that can be done,” Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara said at a Monday news conference at Winnipeg’s Health Sciences Centre.
“We all have the power to make a profound difference for those living with organ failure.”
The province says its new record is thanks to a growing awareness of Manitoba’s organ and tissue donor registry — which came online in 2012 — and the care offered at HSC’s $4.5 million transplant centre, which opened in July 2020 and offers care to donors and recipients both pre- and post-transplant, a news release says.
A record number of 30 Manitobans also made organ donations after they died, up from the 2018 record of 22 donations.
“These 30 individuals and their loved ones selflessly offered a gift to others in need and have given someone a second chance at life,”said Dr. Owen Mooney, the medical director of Transplant Manitoba’s Gift of Life program, which operates out of HSC.
More than 69,000 people have registered with the province’s donor registry since it launched, including 4,000 people last year.
Asagwara is calling for more people to sign up.
Manitoba ‘on par’
Though the number of kidney transplants completed in Manitoba is “on par” with the rest of the country, the goal is to be “a leader in Canada,” since Manitoba has one of the highest rates of kidney failure, Dr. Julie Ho, the medical director of the adult kidney transplant program at HSC, said at the press conference.
“It’s not enough for us to be just as much as the rest of Canada, we want to be better than everyone else,” she said. “We have to be, to help our patients.”
Kidney transplant numbers declined during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, she added, with 2020 and 2022 numbers coming close, but not quite hitting, the typical number of transplants.
“During COVID-19, there was ICU capacity where we were unable to do organ donation, but … this was not unique to Manitoba,” Ho said.
Manitobans over 18 years old with a valid Manitoba personal health information number can sign up for the province’s donor registry online.