According to a report in the Jamaican paper The Gleaner, doctors are suggesting that transplants are cheaper than dialysis, and thus the logical answer to keep health service costs down is to give the patient a transplant. The dialysis patient may require treatment for 20 - 30 or more years, and Professor Everard N. Barton, director of the Caribbean Institute of Nephrology based at the University of the West Indies, Mona, says transplants are far cheaper.
The suggestion is that transplants start to become cheaper overall after two and a half years compared to dialysis, and thus would reduce the strain on the health system. And reduce the long waiting list to get dialysis.
The public should be encouraged to take part in organ donation schemes, thus increasing the number of patients who could be considered for a transplant.
You can read the article in The Gleaner
