The Chain Film

Find your care

The Kidney Exchange Program offers more patients access to a donor kidney. Call 310-267-6907(Link opens phone app) to learn more.

If you are a kidney donor, please contact the Living Donor Line at 866-672-5333(Link opens phone app).

‘The Chain’ Film

Celebrating altruistic kidney donors and their recipients.

Watch a Kidney Donation Chain in Action

A Circle of Care

Produced in 2013, “The Chain” documents the lifesaving impacts of successive kidney donations. It all starts with one altruistic donor willing to give out of the goodness of their heart. It continues as that kidney is transplanted into a recipient who had a donor willing to give a kidney, but was not a match. This chain reaction continues as each donor pays it forward to someone who is compatible with them.

In the film(Link is external), you meet donors talking about what led them to their decision. Follow the journey of recipients and their families before and after the transplant, including actually meeting their donors. “The Chain” shows the incredible power of generosity between loved ones and strangers, from Los Angeles to Boston, in a heartwarming story of care.

The best part of this type of donation? After multiple iterations, 50 or more recipients may get transplanted if the altruism of ONE angel donor continues to be paid forward.

Watch the Chain Film

About Dr. Jeffrey Veale, director of the Kidney Transplantation Exchange Program

As associate professor and director of the UCLA Kidney Transplantation Exchange Program, Dr. Jeffrey Veale’s National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded research focuses on altruistic donors and bridge donors in an effort to expand the donor pool.

The UCLA exchange program under Dr. Veale’s direction has performed more chain transplants than any other single center in the world. He also pioneered the first transcontinental chain transplant in the United States.