Nevada Donor Network describes ARPA-funded upgrades, launches Nevada Transplant Institute to expand in-state transplants

Tyree Gray, the chief administrative and legal officer for the Nevada Donor Network, told the Assembly Committee on Health and Human Services that ARPA grant funds helped the organization “move our organization into a new tier, which is a tier 1a status with CMS.”

Gray and other Nevada Donor Network leaders described investments the nonprofit says expanded organ-recovery capability and clinical capacity so more donated organs can be recovered, preserved and matched for transplant. “Organ donation is one of few areas where both grief and gratitude can exist at the same time,” Gray said.

The Nevada Donor Network said ARPA dollars were used to acquire machine perfusion equipment and to upgrade its clinical histology laboratory. “These machines are able to simulate the organ and they’re kind of able to rehabilitate the organs,” said Elizabeth Shipman, vice president of organ services, who said machine perfusion makes more organs available for transplant. Shipman added the network upgraded its clinical laboratory to a “state of the art histology laboratory.”

Joseph Ferrera, president and CEO of the Nevada Donor Network, described Nevada as a “mass exporter of organs” because local transplantation capacity is limited. “Having one kidney transplant center in Southern Nevada that also transplants pancreas, but no other transplanting center here in the entire state,” he said, creates access barriers that the group is working to address.

To address that gap, the group said it helped catalyze the Nevada Transplant Institute, a nonprofit partnership intended to create local transplant capacity. Ernesto Malmenti, executive vice president and director of the Nevada Transplant Institute, said the new center expects to perform its first transplant in Northern Nevada and told the committee, “We’re here to be number 1 and to make Nevada the transplant capital of The United States.”

Committee members asked about Nevada’s transplant wait list and where Nevadans travel for care. Ferrera said the state currently sends many patients to other states for transplants and that the organization follows the national organ allocation system when placing organs. He estimated that “at least 50 to 200 people” were leaving the state for liver transplants and said that number is likely undercounted.

Shipman credited recent state and legislative changes for increasing local donor authorizations and tissue donation. She said legislation passed last session—identified in testimony as SB 109—allowed partnership with coroner’s offices to provide authorization; she reported that since that measure passed the network “have been able to honor 20 donors and save an additional 80 lives.” She also referenced AB 154, which she said provides education about birth tissue and led to nearly 2,000 placenta donors last year with an expectation of about 3,000 this year.

Gray, who told the panel he is a transplant recipient, said the work is personal: “The Nevada Donor Network saved my life. Thirteen years ago, I received a kidney transplant.” He and other presenters offered to answer committee members’ follow-up questions and to provide additional detail to staff.

The presentation closed without committee action; members asked staff to follow up if they needed additional information.

Looking ahead, the presenters said the Nevada Transplant Institute will begin performing transplants in Northern Nevada and expects to expand available organ transplant services in the state, reducing the need for patients to travel out of state.