In our recent interview with Florence Tsai, a clinical nurse educator and ODTRF-funded Research Challenge winner, we learned more about her innovative project, Exploring the Inpatient Postoperative Experiences of Living Kidney Donors at St. Paul’s Hospital. Along with her team members – Juna Kim, Alisa Sirosis, and Reema Kandola, Florence is committed to improving donor care, enhancing staff training, and shaping patient-centered quality improvements. She shares what inspired this study, why donor experiences matter, and how the findings could inform organ donation and transplant care across Canada.
Q: Describe your project and what inspired you to focus on the experiences of living kidney donors?
A: Our qualitative study explores the inpatient postoperative experiences of living kidney donors at St. Paul’s Hospital using interpretive description methodology through surveys and interviews.
It was inspired by our nursing work with living kidney donors during the postoperative period. I saw opportunities to improve their experiences through observations and informal feedback. This fueled a motivation to optimize their care by better understanding what they go through and what could potentially be improved.
Q: How do you hope the findings will improve clinical care and support for living donors?
A: St. Paul’s Hospital is one of only two sites in B.C. offering living kidney donation surgery. There is no formalized research at our hospital on the postoperative experience of this population. We hope the study will inform patient-centered quality improvement initiatives by using the findings to identify key areas, processes, and protocols that can be improved to better support living kidney donors.
In my capacity as the clinical nurse educator for the inpatient unit responsible for the postoperative care of living kidney donors, I intend to enhance staff onboarding and training protocols by integrating the results of the study.
Q: What do you see as the broader implications of your research for organ donation and transplantation in Canada?
A: Kidney transplantation is a lifesaving and life-changing treatment for people living with kidney disease. Living kidney donation helps people with kidney disease access kidney transplant sooner. Kidney donor experiences matter because they can shape how people and communities feel about kidney donation, which may affect whether people choose to donate. Insights from our study about living kidney donor experiences at Providence Health Care can be used to better support kidney donors at other sites across Canada.
Q: How do you ensure that donor and family partner perspectives are meaningfully integrated in your study?
A: We are thrilled to be working with family partner and advocate, Reema Kandola, who brings her lived experience as a kidney donor to this study and our team. Our goal is to work with Reema and other partners in a way that is meaningful and supports reciprocal relationships. As nurses and researchers, we recognize that we often hold more ‘power’ in relationships with patient and family partners but intend to maintain open communication and check-in regularly with our partners to ensure that their perspectives are integrated throughout this project.