The National Kidney Association states that the odds of dying during kidney donation are about 3 in 100,000, while estimates for risk of death for living liver donors range from 1 in 500 to 1 in 1000. But some of these estimates are from 10 or more years ago, and outcomes have likely improved, said Whitney Jackson, the medical director of living donor liver transplant at UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital, Aurora, Colorado [and assistant professor of medicine at CU School of Medicine].