Implantation Biopsy in Living-Donor Kidney Transplantation: Expectations, Utility, and Limitations.

Kidney transplantation is considered the best treatment for most patients with end-stage kidney disease, and in terms of types, living-donor kidneys have substantial advantages for recipients over deceased-donor kidneys. While quality assessment is integral to deceased-donor kidney allocation (eg, the Kidney Donor Profile Index) as well as offer acceptance decisions, transplant programs may pursue analogous evaluations of living donors and their kidneys. These pretransplant assessments typically incorporate donor demographics, kidney function surrogates, and, in many cases in the United States, kidney biopsy data.