Transplant surgeon reflects on remarkable career
25 September 2025
A transplant surgeon who started his journey in medicine with a five-day trek through a monsoon has reflected on his remarkable career.
Badri Shrestha has worked at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust for 23 years and is still performing kidney transplants at the Northern General Hospital.
He was born in a remote village in Nepal, which had no school. During his childhood frequent abdominal and foot pain kept him and his mum awake at nights, but there were no doctors available outside major cities. It was this experience that inspired to want to become a doctor.
His parents established a village school, where he was educated until he was 14, before he travelled to the capital Kathmandu, to continue his education. This entailed a solo five-day trip through a monsoon by foot, bus and train in 1969.
He said: “I made that journey with nothing at all, in the middle of the monsoon season. The rivers were flooded, and I had to walk for two days, then get various trains and buses via India until after five days I reached Kathmandu.”
This enabled him to attain the qualifications he needed to attain a scholarship to medical school in India, as Nepal had no medical schools at the time. He then completed surgical post-graduate training (MS) in Sri Lanka, again after achieving a scholarship.
It was in Sri Lanka that he began to develop his interest in kidney transplantation, as the country had just started a transplantation programme in 1985. During his service period of 10 years in Nepal, he was honoured by the late King Birendra with medals on three occasions.
A chance meeting with a professor of transplant surgery from Cardiff led to him moving to the UK 1991 to pursue training opportunities in kidney and pancreas transplantation before he moved to Sheffield in 2002.
During in his career he has performed hundreds of transplants as well as procedures such as living kidney donation, laparoscopic nephrectomies (keyhole surgery to remove kidneys), keyhole catheter insertion for dialysis, renal artery aneurysm repair and auto-transplantation (where the kidney is removed for repair and then transplanted back into the patient).
In 2006 he performed a kidney transplant on an 85 year-old man who lived for another seven years with an excellent quality of life. This is a record for the oldest patient have a transplant from a deceased donor.
Mr Shrestha said: “It is a wonderful job because you are making a huge difference to somebody’s life. A lot of surgery involves taking something out, whereas as this involves putting something in and transforming that person’s life.
“Kidney transplantation can give the recipient a much better quality and longer life, with more independence, freedom from dialysis and ability to resume normal activities.
“Being a donor is a wonderful thing to do.”
Mr Shrestha is now also involved in the training of junior surgeons.
Caroline Basarab-Horwath, Living Donor Transplant Coordinator at STH, said: “It has been an absolute privilege to work alongside Badri for over 20 years in the living donor programme. His passion, wisdom and unwavering commitment has shaped the service and inspired everyone.”
If you would like to find out more about organ donation visit: Home - NHS Organ Donation
