About ITOT

Every year, more than 150,000 organ transplants are performed worldwide. Hundreds, perhaps several thousands of these transplants involve ITOT, in which the transplant candidate and/or a prospective living organ donor travel to another country for the purpose of donating an organ or receiving an organ transplant. As the figure below (taken from Irish et al. 2024) demonstrates, people may travel all over the world for transplantation:

Figure 1 Irish et a. 2024 Transplant Direct

ITOT enables many people to access life-changing and life-saving treatment. ITOT may also exacerbate inequities in access to transplantation, and may undermine efforts to develop sustainable donation and transplantation programs. In some cases, ITOT involves organ trafficking.

To learn more about ITOT, please read our paper reporting on the outcomes of a pilot survey of international transplant professionals in which explored their experiences of ITOT and attitudes towards collection and reporting of ITOT data.

Irish GL, Fadhil RA, Rondeau E, Nagral S, Ahmadipour M, Coates PT, Martin DE. International Travel for Organ Transplantation: A Survey of Professional Experiences and Attitudes Toward Data Collection and Reporting. Transplantation Direct. 2024 Jul 1;10(7):e1655.