*Purpose: Donor organ recovery is a complex process involving organ procurement organizations and multiple surgical teams from various transplant centers. According to the Organ Preservation Alliance, one in three deaths in the US might be prevented by an organ transplant. Lack of real-time communication results in many hours of preventable delay between procurement and transplant teams resulting in a high volume of organ waste, clinical frustration, and critical delays.

*Methods: A Plan-Do-Study-Act performance improvement methodology was utilized to design and implement a dedicated mobile communication application (app). Critical time points in the organ offer, procurement, and transplant processes were analyzed from the report of organ offers, and relation coordination metrics were also measured. Members of procurement and transplant teams in Iowa were interviewed and the app was implemented to replace phone calls, emails, faxes, and text messages during a year-long study of deceased donor kidney offers.

*Results: Teams reported substantial increases in clinical productivity and case progress awareness. Additionally, we observed a noticeable reduction in phone calls. The relational coordination data indicated a higher relationship and communication quality score with the app. The report of organ offer data revealed a 35% increase in organs transplanted and a 50% reduction in time from initial organ offer to transplant during the use of the app.

*Conclusions: The use of a dedicated communication app reduces clinical frustration and delays during the coordination of organ offer, procurement, and transplant processes. Technologies that improve communication have the potential to improve organ utilization.

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