Living Organ Donor Recovery Enhancement Program

Donor safety and outcomes are the chief concerns of programs performing living donor liver and kidney transplantation. The protection of donors from physical and emotional harm has been a fundamental principle in living donor liver and kidney donation from the beginning. The safety of living donor hepatectomy and nephrectomy has been established. The risks associated with the donation have been deemed acceptable by the transplant community. The investigators would like to move beyond the safety of the operation and address the most important post-operative issues that potentially cause donors physical and emotional stress: these include pain control, appropriate nutrition for optimal liver regeneration and physical/functional recovery, fatigue, time to return to normal physical and work activity, and difficulties coping with recovery and any possible complications. The goal of conducting this study is to create a program of pre- and post-operative interventions to enhance recovery so that patients can return to their normal quality of life as soon as possible. Currently there is no literature on programs to enhance living donor care and recovery. This study will be conducted to determine if interventions during the pre-operative (a minimum of four weeks in an exercise program), intra-operative (anesthesia), and post-operative (pain management) stages have an effect on liver and kidney donor patients' quality of life and return to baseline functional status.