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Quality in Organ Donation (QUOD)

Make previously unusable organs transplantable

The Quality in Organ Donation (QUOD) programme provides a unique resource to facilitate research in organ donation and transplantation.

The Quality in Organ Donation (QUOD) initiative aims to identify pathways of injury and repair in donors’ organs.

Despite the advances made in recent years in the field of organ donation and increased awareness of the importance of transplantation, a significant and widening disparity exists between organ supply and demand. This disparity is predicted to worsen making this the biggest challenge facing the transplant community today. 

To address this, the transplant community has been turning to organs previously considered unsuitable for transplantation. This has included organs donated from extended criteria donors who may be older or have pre-existing medical conditions. However, further research is required to improve our knowledge and optimise the outcomes for these organs.

The Quality in Organ Donation (QUOD) programme is a unique resource that facilitates transplant research, hosted by the University of Oxford, working in partnership with NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) and academic transplant centres. QUOD is a national consortium working together with Newcastle University, all National Organ Retrieval Service teams, Specialist Nurses in Organ Donation and 61 hospitals across the UK.

QUOD is a national biobank, bringing together:

  • A bioresource to match blood, urine and tissue samples
  • Clinical data on donor management, organ retrieval and preservation, organ function post-transplant and recipient outcome
  • Molecular diagnostics and translational analysis platforms

Key aims of QUOD

  • Identify pathways of injury and apply novel, targeted interventions to repair donor organ injury.
  • Optimise donor management and organ preservation to benefit patients.
  • Translate validated experimental methods and technologies into clinical use and best practice protocols.
  • Validate biomarkers and functional parameters to better predict outcomes following transplantation. 
  • Streamline and promote collaboration and dissemination between scientific and clinical experts in academic institutions across the United Kingdom.

QUOD has collected more than 125,000 samples from over 7,000 donors. More than 80 research project applications have been received, with over 65 having been approved by the QUOD Steering Committee and over 38,000 samples have been supplied to researchers. The latest QUOD statistics can be found on our website. 

Studies supported by QUOD resources have yielded numerous publications, doctoral dissertations, and conference presentations spanning proteomics, genomics, immunology, and other disciplines. 

Research projects have been conducted throughout the UK as well as in the United States, the Netherlands, and Germany, and QUOD has been engaged to support research with a range of high-level projects including the OrQA project, the SIGNET trial, the Human Cell Atlas, the PITHIA trial, UK Renal Imaging Network, REMAP-CAP and RECOVERY trials. 

We invite any academic or industrial researchers interested in using our samples and data to contact us at contact@quod.org.uk or visit quod.org.uk for further details.

Our team

10-year anniversary QUOD logo

Principal Investigator

Selected publications

Latest news

QUOD Innovation Competition 2025

QUOD is excited to announce the launch of the first QUOD Innovation Competition, which is open to research scientists, clinicians, nurses, and allied health professionals wishing to make use of QUOD biobank samples.

Find out more about the competition

QUOD Symposium 2025

We are excited to announce the 8th National QUOD Symposium will be held at Hotel du Vin, Birmingham UK on Thursday 27 March 2025.

View the symposium details

Evolution of the QUOD box

Celebrating our ten year milestone has also been a time for reflection. QUOD has put together a video and blog post to show how the QUOD box has changed over the years. 

Learn more about the QUOD box

QUOD Whole Organ Expansion

A multi-disciplinary team of researchers from Oxford and Newcastle, led by Professor Rutger Ploeg and Professor James Shaw, was awarded a grant of £1.7 million from the Medical Research Council (MRC) in 2018 to enable the expansion of QUOD to establish a whole organ tissue bank.

Read about the developments of the expansion programme

Read the latest edition of the QUOD newsletter

Keep up-to-date with all things QUOD through our triannual newsletter. With each new edition, you can read all about the latest scientific, collaborative and research updates, as well as hear from our researchers about the most recent conference attendances and learn more about the wider QUOD team through questionnaires and our 'Spotlight on a QUOD Colleague' interviews.

Read the latest edition

Related research themes

Transplantation
Transplantation
Storing biological samples for use in research.
Biobanking