In the period from 1 January 1992 through 31 December 1995, a total of 582 renal transplantations were performed at the Department of Cardiovascular and Transplant Surgery of the Prague-based Institute for Clinical and Experimental Medicine. This number does not include combined kidney and pancreas transplantations. In 571 cases, the kidney was transplanted from a cadaveric donor while living related donors were involved in 11 cases. Of the 582 procedures, 515 were first transplantations while the remaining 67 were re-transplantations. The most frequent surgical procedure was lymphocele developing in 70 patients. Urinary fistula was present in 39 patients while 21 patients developed early obstruction or stenosis of the ureter. Other complications included graft rupture, bleeding, vascular thrombosis and a rare case of bowel perforation. Surgical complications required graft nephrectomy in 27 cases (4.6%).