Health care costs for the evaluation, surgery, and follow-up care of living kidney donors

Background The health care costs to evaluate, perform surgery, and follow a living kidney donor for the year after donation are poorly described. Methods We obtained information on the health care costs of 1099 living kidney donors between April 1, 2004 and March 31, 2014 from Ontario, Canada using comprehensive health care administrative databases. We estimated the cost of 3 periods of the living donation process: the predonation evaluation period (start of evaluation until the day before donation), perioperative period (day of donation until 30-days postdonation), and 1 year of follow-up period (after perioperative period until 1-year postdonation). We analyzed data for donors and healthy matched nondonor controls using regression-based methods to estimate the incremental cost of living donation. Costs are presented from the perspective of the Canadian health care payer (2017 $CAD). Results The incremental health care costs (compared with controls) for the evaluation, perioperative, and follow-up periods were $3,596 (95% confidence interval (CI) $3,350-$3,842), $11,694 ($11,415-$11,973), and $1,011 ($793-$1,230), respectively, totalling $16,290 ($15,814-$16,767). The evaluation cost was higher if the intended recipient started dialysis part-way through the donor evaluation [$886 ($19, $1,752)]. The perioperative cost varied across transplant centers (p

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