In partnership with LifeSource, the new unit improves organ donor care, alleviates hospital capacity strain across the state, and better serves the community.
MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. – April 10, 2025 – M Health Fairview, in partnership with LifeSource, celebrates the opening of its Donor Care Unit, a facility designed to increase the number of lives saved through organ donation in Minnesota and beyond. As the first of its kind in Minnesota, the freestanding unit improves the care of deceased organ donors, allowing transplant teams to use the most advanced organ recovery techniques to ensure more organs successfully reach those in need.
“When a donor gives the gift of life, it’s critical that we do everything we can to ensure a successful transplant for someone on the waiting list,” said Andrew Adams, MD, PhD, executive medical director of solid organ transplant with M Health Fairview and professor and chief of the Division of Transplantation at the University of Minnesota Medical School. “Our Donor Care Unit enables us to be better stewards of these generous gifts and deliver the best possible transplant care.”
Housed on the M Health Fairview University of Minnesota Medical Center campus, the new unit builds on a legacy of excellence. The center is home to one of the oldest and largest transplant programs in the world, with more than 18,000 organ and stem cell transplants performed over the past 50 years.
“Organ donation is a rare gift,” said Kelly White, CEO of LifeSource. “Every opportunity matters, and this Donor Care Unit will help us – together – save more lives. We are so grateful to M Health Fairview for their collaboration in making this vision a reality.”
How the Donor Care Unit works
When a deceased organ donor is identified, LifeSource coordinates the donor’s transfer from non-
transplant hospitals in the Twin Cities metro area and St. Cloud to the M Health Fairview Donor Care Unit. Dedicated M Health Fairview nursing staff cares for the donor while LifeSource evaluates organs suitable for transplant and facilitates the matching process with transplant candidates around the region. Once a match is found, transplant teams recover the organs to provide a lifesaving gift.
The benefits
- Equipped with dedicated care teams and advanced imaging and diagnostic technology to optimize organ care and improve transplant outcomes.
- Enables quicker organ recovery, benefiting the donor family.
- Frees up critical care beds in hospitals across Minnesota and beyond by transferring deceased donors to M Health Fairview’s unit.
What to know about organ donation
- There are currently over 100,000 people on the national transplant waiting list, including over 2,600 in the Upper Midwest.
- Every eight minutes, someone is added to the organ transplant waiting list.
- Organ donation continues to be rare – only 1% of people who die meet the criteria to be organ donors.
- One donor can save up to eight lives through organ donation and heal more than 75 lives through tissue and eye donation.
About M Health Fairview
M Health Fairview is the newly expanded collaboration between the University of Minnesota, University of Minnesota Physicians, and Fairview Health Services. The healthcare system combines the best of academic and community medicine – expanding access to world-class, breakthrough care through our 10 hospitals and 60 clinics.
About LifeSource
LifeSource is the community-based, non-profit organization dedicated to saving lives through organ and tissue donation in the Upper Midwest, serving more than seven million people in communities across Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota. We are relentlessly pursuing a day when no one dies waiting for a life-saving transplant.
Learn more at Life-source.org.
