Kidney exchange at NEPKE

The Sunday Globe has a good story about a recent three way kidney exchange at the New England Program for Kidney Exchange. One of the donors was a prominent local nephrologist.
Harvesting hope from a giving tree: The story of three couples, three kidneys and one goal: life.

It's a well written article that illustrates both some of the logistical complexities of a three way exchange, and some of the personal details of the six participants.

I'm always glad to see three way exchanges, in part because for a while it seemed like the logistical difficulties would preclude them.

Here are the papers which helped us make the case in New England:

Saidman, Susan L., Alvin E. Roth, Tayfun Sönmez, M. Utku Ünver, and Francis L. Delmonico, " Increasing the Opportunity of Live Kidney Donation By Matching for Two and Three Way Exchanges," Transplantation, ,81, 5, March 15, 2006, 773-782.

Roth, Alvin E., Tayfun Sonmez , and M. Utku Unver, "Efficient Kidney Exchange: Coincidence of Wants in Markets with Compatibility-Based Preferences," (May, 2005. NBER Paper w11402), American Economic Review, 97, 3, June 2007, 828-851. (And here is the online appendix with some of the proofs.)

One of the curious things about publishing in both economics and medical journals is that the paper which came first was published second...the AER takes a bit longer than Transplantation.