Over 60% of Transplant-Related Surgeries in Japan Concentrated on Weekends, Holidays; Weekdays Booked Up With Other Types of Surgeries

The Yomiuri Shimbun

2:00 JST, February 22, 2025

More than 60% of the surgeries to remove organs from donors who were declared brain dead were concentrated on weekends and holidays in 2024, creating a staff and hospital bed shortage on those days, according to a Yomiuri Shimbun analysis.

According to a Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry survey, 26 facilities declined to accept organs for transplants in 2023 due to inadequacies in their systems, resulting in 803 patients not being able to receive organ transplants. One reason for this is that many organ removal surgeries were performed on weekends and holidays, and requests for transplant facilities to accept organs were concentrated on those days.

According to The Yomiuri Shimbun’s analysis of data released by the Japan Organ Transplant Network (JOT), there were 130 organ donations in 2024, the second highest number following the previous year’s figure of 132. The surgeries were performed on weekends or holidays for 83 of the cases, or 64%, in 2024. The figure is two higher compared to the previous year, which was the previous high.

One reason organ removal surgeries tend to be concentrated on weekends and holidays is that weekdays are usually already filled with other types of surgeries, such as those related to cancer and heart disease. As a result, organ removal surgeries, which often come in unexpectedly, are scheduled for weekends. Another reason is that it is more convenient for family members to gather and say their final goodbyes to brain-dead patients on weekends.

There is a growing trend for the number of organ removal surgeries to be concentrated on weekends and holidays.

In the five years up to 2019, 41% of the organ removal surgeries were performed on weekends and holidays on average. The figure increased to 61% on average in the five years up to 2024.

The number of days on which multiple removal surgeries were performed on the same day in 2024 was 27, the second highest on record. Of these, 22 days were a weekend or holiday.

In particular, heart, lung and liver transplants tend to be concentrated at a few medical institutions. According to the analysis, the top three institutions — hospitals connected with the University of Tokyo, Kyoto University and Tohoku University — accounted for 51%.

The health ministry is taking such measures as allowing patients waiting for a transplant to register at two or more transplant facilities, so that even if a facility declines to accept an organ, patients can receive the transplant at another facility.