*Purpose: Recently published literature has demonstrated favorable outcomes for Robotic Kidney Transplant (RKT) in high BMI recipients. The University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) has accumulated more than 10 years of experience and more than 380 robotic kidney transplants for recipients with high BMI. In order to facilitate training for other transplant programs interested in RKT, we have developed a dedicated training course.

*Methods: From July 2018 to July 2021, eight surgical teams from preeminent transplant centers participate in a three-day training course for RKT at UIC. The course provided one day in the operating room during the performance of a robotic hand-assisted nephrectomy and RKT in recipients with high BMI, one day in the robotic surgical lab performing vascular and ureter-bladder anastomosis in simulated models, and finally one day with a live pig model to perform the robotic hand assisted nephrectomy and kidney transplant. UIC transplant surgery attendings provided training and assistance to the invitees during the entire course. The pig model session is recorded and sent to each trained transplant center for future references. All participants kept in communication via email afterwards. To collect the most updated information all transplant centers received a survey in October 2021 to evaluate the progress of starting RKT on patients with high BMI.

*Results: All of the 8 transplant teams completed the three days course. All the participants completed the vascular and ureteral robotic anastomosis in the unanimated model. Six teams obtained optimal perfusion of the pig kidney after completing of the iliac vascular anastomosis, confirmed with Indocyanine green fluorescence. A survey performed shows that 5 of 8 teams incorporated the robotic hand assisted laparoscopic surgeries in their transplant programs, three of these 5 are performing only robotic laparoscopic hand-assisted nephrectomy and two programs are doing both, living donor and RKT in patients with high BMI (one of the programs successfully completed 11 RKT in patients with high BMI).

*Conclusions: Our preliminary data suggest that this course offers a reproducible model to train surgical teams interested in performing of RKT in patients with high BMI. About 62% of the participants programs successfully implemented robotic-assisted surgery in their clinical activity. Further data will be collected to document the validity of this program.

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