TREATMENT / ABROAD GUIDE BD
What a kidney transplant involves, how Bangladeshi patients plan one abroad, and why almost every figure has to be quoted per case.
Reviewed by our clinical review panel · Cost data checked 20 October 2026 · Sources linked on the cost file
A kidney transplant is an operation in which a donated kidney is placed in the lower abdomen and connected to the recipient’s blood vessels and bladder. The recipient’s own kidneys are usually left where they are; the donated kidney does the filtering.
A kidney can come from a living or a deceased donor. Living donation is a separate operation on a healthy person, with its own assessment, risks and recovery, and it is regulated differently in every country.
The preparation is longer than the operation. The recipient’s tissue type and antibodies are checked against the donor’s, the donor is assessed medically and psychologically, and both are reviewed by a transplant committee before a date is fixed. In many programmes that takes weeks to months, partly in Dhaka and partly at the centre.
The operation itself usually takes a few hours. Expect a period in a high-dependency or intensive unit, then a ward, then a clinic phase with regular blood tests to see how the donated kidney is working.
Follow-up does not end at discharge: monitoring and medication continue indefinitely, and patients normally see a nephrologist at home between visits to the transplant centre.
Transplant assessment is a decision for a transplant team. It is not a threshold printed on a website, and this page cannot apply it to your case. What can be described is the shape of the assessment.
Living-donor legal requirements differ by country and are not covered here. Some destinations restrict donation by non-citizens; some require a proven relationship and a committee approval in the donor’s own country; some prohibit payment in any form. Ask the transplant centre and the destination’s embassy what applies before any assessment begins, and take Bangladeshi legal advice for the donor’s side too.
This page does not discuss immunosuppression regimens, and nothing here is a view on whether a transplant is the right treatment for you.
Kidney transplant is the one procedure in our file where no destination publishes a total price. Every cell below is a single component of a bill or quoted per case; none is a transplant price.
Destination
What is published
Figure
Basis and what it covers
Bangladesh
What is published
No published transplant price
Figure
quoted per case
Basis and what it covers
No Dhaka transplant price located in our review
India
What is published
A band we do not rely on
Figure
quoted per case
Basis and what it covers
Apollo prints Rs 1,00,000–2,50,000, the same band as its knee page; far below any international transplant quote, so ask its international desk for a written figure
Thailand
What is published
No package; quote only
Figure
quoted per case
Basis and what it covers
Thai transplant law restricts non-Thai recipients — confirm before planning anything
Turkey
What is published
No transplant line in the price index
Figure
quoted per case
Basis and what it covers
Quote only; the Acibadem index is 75 procedures with no transplant entry
Malaysia
What is published
No published transplant price
Figure
quoted per case
Basis and what it covers
No Malaysian provider publishes one
Singapore
What is published
Surgeon’s professional fee, recipient only
Figure
S$13,500–20,900
Basis and what it covers
MOH fee benchmark, 1 Jun 2026. Excludes hospital fee, anaesthetist, medication and the donor’s surgery
Sri Lanka
What is published
No published transplant price
Figure
quoted per case
Basis and what it covers
No Sri Lankan private provider price list located
The Singapore row is the one published figure we can cite, and it is one line of a bill rather than the bill: the benchmark covers the surgeon’s fee for the recipient alone, while hospital charges, the anaesthetist, medication and the donor’s operation sit outside it.
Everywhere else the answer is a written estimate. A usable one names the recipient’s workup and stay, the donor’s workup and stay, the theatre and intensive-care days, and what happens if the stay runs long. Ask for the donor’s costs separately: a quote covering only the recipient is not the cost of a living-donor transplant.
How treatment costs work explains what our cost file records, and what it refuses to record.
These are hospitals in our file whose listed specialities name a transplant or kidney programme. The file is not a ranking, and being listed is not a recommendation. Every destination’s transplant pricing was quote-only. Ten hospitals in our file list a transplant or kidney programme; three of them are below.
New Delhi, India. Filed specialities include nephrology and the hospital’s own kidney transplant programme. JCI-accredited (IHCO 60000506).
India medical guide Chennai, India. Filed under multi-visceral and abdominal organ transplant, with a dedicated transplant programme and a published international desk number. JCI-accredited (IHCO 60008886).
India medical guide Colombo, Sri Lanka. Filed specialities include kidney transplant centres alongside cancer care and cardiac surgery. JCI-accredited (IHCO 60004894).
Sri Lanka medical guideThe full list is in the hospital directory.
A transplant timeline starts weeks before the operation and does not end when you fly home. What follows is the shape of it, for an uncomplicated course.
Plan for a longer stay than the operation suggests, and ask the centre what it expects to happen in Dhaka afterwards. Patients who travel home early usually do so because the local follow-up was agreed in advance, in writing, with a named doctor on both sides.
A transplant is major surgery, so it carries the risks of major surgery as well as risks specific to transplantation. These are categories, not probabilities; the consent discussion is where they are weighed.
Two risks are specific to going abroad: rejection or infection appearing after you are home, and the local team and transplant centre disagreeing about what to do next. Both are managed by agreeing in writing, before the operation, who is responsible for what and how records will be shared.
Why is there no transplant price on this page?
Because no hospital in our file publishes one. The only published figure we can cite is Singapore’s surgeon fee, and that is one line of the bill. Anyone offering a total transplant price without a written estimate is guessing.
Can a relative donate a kidney abroad?
Sometimes, but the rules differ by country and are not covered on this page. Many destinations require a proven relationship, a committee approval and documentation from the donor’s home country; some restrict non-citizen donors entirely. Ask the transplant centre and the destination’s embassy before any assessment begins.Donor eligibility has changed, and this page does not settle it. Bangladesh's Human Organ Transplantation Act 1999 is no longer the operative instrument. A 2019 High Court ruling allowed emotional kidney donation by close relatives or known persons; an Organ Transplantation Ordinance in November 2025 widened eligible living donors; and the Human Organ Transplantation Act 2026 extended eligibility to emotionally related donors (Oxford Human Rights Hub analysis, September 2026, checked 22 October 2026).We have not reproduced the age limits, the permitted relationship list or the authorisation-committee procedure, because those sit in the statutory text and a wrong detail there is worse than none. Confirm the current position with the hospital's transplant coordinator and the Ministry of Health before any donor is worked up.
How long before the operation do we need to arrive?
Usually several days, for final cross-matching and assessment. The transplant centre sets the date, and with a deceased-donor offer it can move at very short notice.
What happens after we return to Dhaka?
Follow-up with a nephrologist at home, with results sent back to the transplant centre, is the usual arrangement. Agree it before the operation: which tests, how often, and who at the transplant centre will take the call.
Does the quoted figure include the donor’s costs?
Often not. Ask for the donor’s workup, operation and stay to be itemised separately from the recipient’s. A quote that covers only the recipient is not the cost of a living-donor transplant.
Is a transplant better than dialysis for me?
This page cannot answer that. It is a conversation with your nephrologist, using your own results and your own circumstances, and it is not something a comparison table can settle. How long a transplanted kidney keeps working. UK national data, reported by NHS Blood and Transplant, puts five-year graft survival for kidneys from deceased donors at 87% (NHSBT annual activity report, checked 22 October 2026). That is a national average across all centres, not a prediction for you: living-donor grafts generally last longer, and your own match, age and adherence to immunosuppression matter more than any average.
Send us the nephrologist’s summary, the latest creatinine and eGFR, the blood group, and the tissue typing if it has already been done. If a living donor is being considered, tell us their relationship to you and their blood group. We will approach the transplant centres whose filed specialities match and ask what their assessment process and written estimate look like.
Request a written quote