UCalgary Alumnus renowned for paired kidney donation program

Posted June 4, 2009
By Jordanna Heller

U of C alumni, Dr. Jeffrey Veale explains the kidney "donor chain": photo credit: Bruce PerraultYou may have seen Dr. Jeffrey Veale’s work featured on a recent episode of Grey’s Anatomy. He’s the brains behind a national paired kidney donation program out of UCLA (The University of California at Los Angeles).

The program allows people who want to give a kidney to a loved one – but aren’t a match – to donate through an exchange known as a “donor chain.” The donor is able to create an altruistic “chain reaction” by giving a kidney to a stranger who is compatible so that the donor’s loved one receives a kidney from a stranger who matches.

Veale was able to overcome the obstacle of donors living in different cities, which limits the length of the chain. He recognized that donor kidneys could be removed and shipped to a recipient transplant centre, so that the donor did not need to travel to that centre.

Dr. Veale is a U of C Faculty of Medicine graduate, and this year’s Arch Award recipient of Graduate of the Last Decade (Gold) Award. Other Arch Award recipients are Peter K.K. Wong with the 2009 Distinguished Alumni Award, and Mark Blackwell with the inaugural Future Alumni Award.

Read more about the Arch Awards here:

http://www.ucalgary.ca/alumni/awards/archawards