Mayo Clinic on list of national transplant centers with best outcomes

Friday, March 07, 2008

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. – Organ transplant programs at Mayo Clinic in Arizona are being studied by other transplant centers around the country as part of a national effort to improve transplant outcomes.

The effort, the Transplant Growth and Management Collaborative, organized by the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), has resulted in a special Learning Session that took place in Phoenix March 4 and 5, attended by representatives of 250 transplant facilities in the country, Mayo included. The concept of the HRSA program is to examine the most successful U.S. transplant programs, identify their strengths and best practices and then disseminate those practices to other transplant centers.

The Learning Session in Phoenix followed site visits by HRSA to 15 rapidly-growing facilities that performed a high volume of liver, kidney, heart and pancreas transplant procedures, yet maintained a high rate of success. Mayo Clinic was included on this list, and presented to conference attendees.

From their studies, HRSA has identified six factors that distinguished successful transplant programs. The factors are a strong management commitment to their transplant program, careful nurturing of skilled staff, aggressive programs to care for donors, a strong focus on patients and families, tight cost management and strong dedication to successful patient outcomes. David Douglas, M.D., chair of Mayo Clinic's Division of Transplant Medicine, said the transplant process is complex. "Not only do the surgeries have to be performed," he says, "but there are many other aspects to a successful program, including managing the waiting lists, obtaining organs, patient follow-up and conducting the necessary referrals and evaluations."

Between 1999 and 2007, the number of transplant surgeries conducted at Mayo Clinic in Arizona increased nearly tenfold—from 33 to 301. "Even so, we've been able to maintain excellent outcomes," Dr. Douglas says.

Following an earlier HRSA collaborative on the consent rates of potential donors, the rates jumped from 52 to 67 percent. Still, the main challenge for transplant centers across the nation remains identifying qualified donors.

"The limiting factor is always the number of donors available," says Dr. Douglas. "Each year, 13 percent of all patients awaiting transplants die before an organ becomes available. We need to make sure all transplant programs are operating efficiently so we can help as many people as possible."

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Mayo Clinic is the first and largest integrated, not-for-profit group practice in the world. As a leading academic medical center in the Southwest, Mayo Clinic focuses on providing specialty and surgical care in more than 65 disciplines at its outpatient facility in north Scottsdale and at Mayo Clinic Hospital. The 244 licensed-bed hospital is located at 56th Street and Mayo Boulevard (north of Bell Road) in northeast Phoenix, and provides inpatient care to support the medical and surgical specialties of the clinic, which is located at 134th Street and Shea Boulevard in Scottsdale.

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