Safe and ethical living kidney donation in Qatar : a national health systems approach

Abstract EN

The increasing incidence of end-stage kidney disease in Qatar has led to growing demand for donor kidneys.

The deceased donor kidney program has yet to achieve its full potential; hence, living kidney donation has been widely adopted as an appropriate alternative.

The reliance on living kidney donors however, raises a number of social, ethical, and legal concerns surrounding informed consent, voluntarism, psychosocial evaluation, perioperative care, and long-term follow-up of living kidney donors.

Many of these concerns become heightened in a multicultural, multilingual society within a Gulf country such as Qatar.

This article provides an insight into the challenges that living kidney donation poses in a multiethnic society with significant socioeconomic divides.

It also discusses the remedial measures that the Qatari government, healthcare authorities, and transplant community have adopted to address these issues.