Beyond the Pump: The Full Value of a Comprehensive NRP Partner
When evaluating a normothermic regional perfusion (NRP) provider, many organizations focus on cost and clinical coverage. However, the quality of an NRP program is often determined by factors that are less visible: team continuity, standardized training, logistical support, and the ability to navigate complex clinical decisions in real time. The right partner can help ensure every donor gift is maximized and every organ opportunity is pursued.
With ProCure, organizations don’t have to piece together an NRP program on their own. We bring the clinical expertise, trained and familiar teams, logistics, coordination, and operational support needed to make each case successful.
The Training
Any surgeon or perfusionist ProCure assigns to an NRP case has completed ProCure’s NRP training program. Regardless of their prior experience or training, every team member goes through the same training process to ensure they are fully aligned with ProCure’s processes and protocols and have had the opportunity to build familiarity with the team before taking on a case independently.
Our training program includes rigorous didactic lectures, wet labs, skills assessments, and multiple opportunities to assist on cases before working independently. This approach, combined with our standardized processes and protocols, creates consistency across team members. Just as importantly, it allows our clinicians to become familiar with one another and develop the communication and teamwork that are critical in the donor OR.
The Team
In our experience, we have found that familiarity and consistency breed better outcomes. Our failure to get on pump remains extremely low, less than 1%. While we attribute this success to our clinical expertise and standardized processes and protocols, we also believe our team’s familiarity with one another plays a significant role. We typically send a complete team, which includes a surgeon (surgeon selection will depend on cannulation approach), perfusionist (specifically CCPs), and an assistant. While we are mindful about introducing variability that could increase risk, we will pair our teams with a client’s surgeon or perfusion resources. In these scenarios we are thoughtful and deliberate in how we implement new approaches and have systems and processes in place to ensure consistency in protocols and cohesive team communication.
The Equipment
We never lose sight of the fact that we are guests in a donor hospital, and because of that we have structured our offering so we show up with almost everything we need for an NRP case. This includes all pump equipment, disposables, POC testing, and medications.
The Hidden Gems: Donor Consults, Risk Assessments
While it is easy to put a financial value on a service itself, it does not account for the value-added services that ultimately save a client time and money. Because NRP is what our team does every day, they bring a level of familiarity and real-time clinical judgment that comes from experience across a wide range of donor presentations.
Donor Consults
Given their breadth of experience, our team brings a unique skillset to evaluating donors. We offer donor consults on all DCD donors to help review available donor details and determine the best cannulation approach, factoring in donor-specific risks, organ evaluation, and recovery opportunities. At the request of OPO staff, our surgeons will also assist in the communication to potential accepting surgeons.
NRP Risk Assessment Tool
ProCure recently launched a proprietary NRP Risk Assessment Tool designed to bring greater consistency and objectivity to donor evaluation. The tool reviews donor medical history, current clinical presentation, and key risk variables to assess the anticipated complexity of the case and guide procedural planning.
Rather than relying solely on individual experience or subjective interpretation, the assessment uses predefined criteria and evidence-based thresholds to identify factors that may impact cannulation strategy, perfusion management, or overall NRP success. By standardizing the evaluation process, clinicians reviewing the same donor information arrive at a more consistent assessment, helping reduce variability in decision-making and improve case preparation.
NRP creates valuable time for organ assessment, optimization, and allocation, often opening additional opportunities that may not have existed at the start of the case. It’s important to choose a partner that has the clinical expertise to make the most of that opportunity, as well as the training, team consistency, risk assessment, coordination, and logistical support to execute each case with confidence. ProCure brings all of these elements together, providing more than an NRP service; we provide a comprehensive partnership designed to help clients maximize every donor and pursue every viable organ opportunity.
To learn more about ProCure’s NRP offering, contact your Client Success Lead or partner@procureodx.com.