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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2011 Feb 19.
Published in final edited form as: N Engl J Med. 2010 Aug 19;363(8):724–732. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa1000950

Figure 1. Schematic Diagram of Linkage of Study Data Sources.

Figure 1

Identifiers from the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN) were linked to the administrative data of a private U.S. health insurer for 4650 living kidney donors from October 1987 through July 2007. Post-nephrectomy medical diagnoses and conditions requiring medical treatment were ascertained from billing claims. Cox regression analyses with left and right censoring to account for observed periods of insurance benefits were used to estimate absolute prevalence and prevalence ratios for diagnoses after nephrectomy. Prevalence patterns were then compared with those in the 2005–2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) for the general population. U.S. Census data were incorporated according to residential ZIP Code at the time of donor nephrectomy.