Frequently Asked Questions

SRTR stands for the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients. It is operated by the Minneapolis Medical Research Foundation (MMRF) under contract with HRSA (part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services). SRTR collects data on every organ transplant performed in the United States and publishes semi-annual Program-Specific Reports (PSRs) that are available to the public.

Graft survival rate measures the percentage of transplanted organs (grafts) that are still functioning at 1 year or 3 years after transplant. A lower graft survival rate means more transplants failed within the measurement period. SRTR compares each program's rate against a national expected rate that controls for patient risk factors.

Rankings on PlainTransplant are based on 1-year graft survival rate as reported by SRTR. Programs with higher 1-year survival rates are ranked higher. When two programs share the same reported rate, alphabetical tiebreaking is used. Rankings use sequential numbering without ties.

No, and we strongly advise against it. Choosing a transplant center is a complex medical decision that should be made with your healthcare team. Rankings are based on one statistical measure (1-year graft survival) and don't reflect wait times, acceptance criteria, patient support programs, or many other important factors. Consult your physician and consider multiple sources including SRTR's official PSR reports.

Programs that perform fewer transplants have statistically less stable rates, small fluctuations in outcomes have a larger proportional effect. A program that performed 20 transplants and had 2 graft failures will show a 90% survival rate, but that same rate for a program with 500 transplants means something different statistically. SRTR provides statistical flags when outcomes are significantly different from the national expected rate.

Waitlist data from SRTR Table B1 shows how many new patients were added to the waiting list and how many active patients are waiting at each program. Higher new listing counts indicate a program accepts more patients. Higher active waiting counts reflect the current demand at that program. Waitlist times vary by organ type, blood type, medical urgency, and geographic region.

Our database is built from SRTR's November 2025 semi-annual release (CSRS 2511). SRTR publishes updated Program-Specific Reports twice per year, typically in spring and fall. We update our database when new semi-annual releases become available.

The survival statistics shown on PlainTransplant include both deceased-donor and living-donor transplants as reported in SRTR's aggregate PSR tables. SRTR does not split these in the public-facing tables we use for our database.