About Kidney Transplant

Overview of Kidney Transplant

Singapore General Hospital (SGH) is the first and largest hospital in Singapore. Singapore kidney transplant programme performed its first deceased donor renal transplant in South-East Asia on 8th July 1970. Subsequently in 1976, the first living kidney donor transplant in Singapore was also performed at the Singapore General Hospital. 

Singapore General Hospital has a rich has a rich heritage in providing an extensive array of services, ranging from research to transplant training of fellows, post-graduate transplant residency, nurses and allied health.  The programme runs solid organ transplant courses for nurses on a regular basis.  With over 1000 kidney transplant recipients and living donors under its follow-up, the renal transplant programme is equipped with the state of the art facilities and multidisciplinary staff to provide advanced and team-based care, putting patients at the hearts of all we do. The renal transplant programme also provides comprehensive post-graduate transplant training to healthcare providers such as the senior residency programme in renal medicine as well as the annual solid organ transplant nursing course.

The Department of Renal Medicine at SGH is also accredited by the International Society of Nephrology for training in renal medicine and has host fellows for training in renal medicine and transplantation. The SGH transplant research programme partners with local and international research leaders in the fore front of transplant research to develop new diagnostics and therapeutics to give the best and affordable care for our patients.

The kidneys are vital organs responsible for multiple essential body functions. They:

• Remove waste products from the body
• Maintain optimal fluid balance
• Regulate acid and mineral levels such as salt and potassium
• Produce hormones that support blood pressure control, red blood cell production, and bone health
• Remove drugs and medications from the body

When the kidneys are no longer able to perform these essential functions, the body accumulates waste, water, acid, and minerals. This leads to symptoms such as nausea, poor appetite, swollen limbs, breathlessness, and eventually life‑threatening complications if left untreated.

Kidney transplantation is the preferred treatment for suitable patients, providing better long‑term outcomes and quality of life compared to dialysis. 

Patients may receive a transplant through:

• Living donor transplantation, often the fastest pathway to transplantation
• Deceased donor transplantation, requiring eligibility assessment and registration on the National Transplant Registry System (NTRS)

Medical teams conduct comprehensive screening, including metabolic, cardiac, infectious disease and cancer evaluations, to ensure suitability for transplant. 

We care for patients with:

• End‑stage kidney failure, where the kidneys can no longer perform their essential functions 
• Complications of kidney failure, including hormone imbalance, bone disease, anaemia, and fluid overload 
• Complications related to dialysis or pre‑transplant disease progression
• Post‑transplant complications, such as rejection, infections (e.g., pneumonia, urinary tract infections, BK virus infection), and post‑transplant cancers

Our services include:

• Evaluation and preparation on potential candidates for renal transplantation or living kidney donation
• Perform deceased and living kidney donor transplantation, ABO and HLA incompatible kidney transplantation and paired kidney donor exchange transplantation
• Evaluation and diagnosing of complications of renal transplantation
• Provision for complex immunosuppression and transplant related support services for non-renal transplant recipients
• Provision for care and follow-up of living kidney donors
• Delivery of multidisciplinary patient counselling and education

The transplant centre runs specialties clinics to cater for the needs of the programme:

• Post discharge and early transplant review clinic where patients recently receiving a kidney transplant are followed up by a multidisciplinary team for the 1st 3 months before being discharge to their primary renal physician for long term follow-up
• Kidney transplant assessment clinics where patients are evaluated by a multidisciplinary team to assess and prepare for renal transplantation
• Wait-list management clinics where patients listed for a deceased donor kidney transplantation are seen regularly to ensure they remain in good health for deceased donor kidney transplantation if they are called up for one
• Living donor follow-up clinics where individuals who have donated a kidney before for living kidney donor transplantation are followed – up yearly to monitor their health after donation
• Counselling clinics where patients attend counselling sessions with our transplant coordinators to learn more about kidney transplantation and donation. Counselling clinics are available at Changi General Hospital too.