Robot-Assisted Kidney Transplantation

This paper describes robot-assisted kidney transplantation (RAKT) from a living donor. The robot is docked between the parted legs of the patient, placed ...

University of Ulsan College of Medicine

BACKGROUND Patients receiving ABO-incompatible (ABOi) or human leukocyte antigen (HLA)-incompatible (HLAi) kidney transplantation (KT) require potent immunosuppression and are thus at a higher risk of infectious complications. We evaluated the clinical outcomes of KT stratified by ABO and HLA incompatibilities and identified the factors associated with the clinical outcomes. MATERIAL AND METHODS Recipients who underwent living-related KT between 2012 and 2017 were included and classified into 4 groups: ABO-compatible and HLA-compatible (ABOc/HLAc), HLA-incompatible (ABOc/HLAi), ABO-incompatible (ABOi/HLAc), and ABO-incompatible and HLA-incompatible (ABOi/HLAi). Cox proportional hazards regression analyses were carried out to evaluate the risk factors of acute rejection. Out of the 1732 patients who underwent KT, 1190, 131, 358, and 53 were in the ABOc/HLAc, ABOi/HLAc, ABOc/HLAi, and ABOi/HLAi groups, respectively. RESULTS The ABO/HLAi group showed the lowest 5-year graft survival rate (91.7%). Death-censored graft survival was not significantly different among the groups. The mortality rate from infections was significantly higher in the ABOi/HLAi group (7.5%) than the other groups. Antibody-mediated rejection-free graft survival was the lowest in the ABOi/HLAi group, with significant differences compared with the ABOi/HLAc group (P=0.02) and the ABOc/HLAi group (P=0.03). ABOi/HLAi (hazard ratio [HR], 2.63; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.04-6.65; P<0.01) and combined infection (HR, 1.91; 95% CI, 1.45-2.51; P<0.01) were significant risk factors for acute rejection. CONCLUSIONS Patients with both ABO and HLA incompatibilities showed inferior rates of overall patient and graft survival due to infectious complications. Infection was a prominent risk factor of acute rejection following KT after adjusting for possible confounders including ABO and HLA incompatibility.

Acute Rejection and Infectious Complications in ABO- and HLA-Incompatible Kidney Transplantations.

BACKGROUND Given that pregnancy is an immune-sensitizing event, female kidney transplant recipients who receive allografts from their offspring or husbands may have a higher risk of rejection and graft failure due to pre-sensitization acquired during pregnancy or childbirth. We investigated the association between donor relatedness (i.e., offspring, husband, unrelated) and graft survival among female living-donor kidney transplant (LDKT) recipients with pregnancy histories. MATERIAL AND METHODS From January 2009 to January 2018, a total of 2060 LDKTs were performed at Asan Medical Center, Seoul, Korea. After excluding HLA-incompatible transplantation, re-transplantation, and those without a clear history of childbirth, 390 female recipients were included and categorized into group I (offspring-to-mother, n=175), group II (husband-to-wife, n=159), and group III (unrelated, n=56). The primary endpoint was biopsy-proven acute rejection (BPAR) and graft survival. We also evaluated delayed graft function (DGF), death-censored graft failure, and mortality. RESULTS Group I had the lowest number of HLA mismatches (p<0.001), and group II had the highest number of ABO-incompatible transplantations (p=0.005). At 5 years after transplant, graft survival and death-censored graft survival did not significantly differ among the 3 groups (graft survival: 96.0% vs. 95.5% vs. 93.3%, p=0.685; death-censored graft survival: 98.3% vs. 97.5% vs. 100%, p=0.732). Five-year BPAR-free survival showed no significant differences among the 3 groups (88.6 vs. 88.7 vs. 88.6%, p=0.842). Group II had the highest rate of clinical rejection (p=0.103) and DGF (p=0.174), but the difference was not statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS Female LDKT recipients with possible pregnancy-related pre-sensitization who received grafts from offspring or husbands did not show significantly worse clinical outcomes than those who received grafts from unrelated donors.

Outcomes of Living-Donor Kidney Transplantation in Female Recipients with Possible Pregnancy-Related Pre-Sensitization According to Donor Relationship.

Laboratory biomarkers that can differentiate non-infectious fever from infectious fever after pancreas transplantation have yet to be discovered. Non-infectious fever was defined as the presence of fever (>38.3°C) in the absence of a documented clinical diagnosis of infection or a positive culture. Among 184 consecutive recipients, a total of 91 recipients developed fever within 1-month post-transplant, of whom 46 had infectious fever and 45 had non-infectious fever at our center between August 2014 and July 2019. The onset of fever was earlier in the non-infectious fever group (14.4 ± 3.7 post-transplant days) compared with the infectious fever group (16.5 ± 5.8 post-transplant days; p = .033). Multivariate analysis showed that serum procalcitonin at the peak of fever could significantly differentiate infectious fever from non-infectious fever (OR 53.378, 95% CI: 6.819-417.802, p < .001). The area under the curve for differentiating between the two groups was 0.853 (95% CI, 0.780-0.926) for procalcitonin and 0.667 (95% CI, 0.549-0.785) for CRP. The best cutoff values of serum procalcitonin and CRP were 0.405 ng/ml (sensitivity, 77.1%; specificity, 80.8%) and 7.355 mg/dl (sensitivity, 66.7%; specificity, 67.3%), respectively. Serum procalcitonin may be useful for differentiating non-infectious fever from infectious fever after pancreas transplantation.

Serum procalcitonin as a biomarker for differentiating between infectious and non-infectious fever after pancreas transplantation.

Type 2 diabetes develops in the presence of chronic overnutrition and genetic susceptibility, and causes insulin resistance and relative insulin deficiency. We hypothesized that islet transplantation can improve insulin sensitivity by modifying the mediators of insulin sensitivity in the pancreas, liver, muscle, and adipose tissues.

Islet isograft transplantation improves insulin sensitivity in a murine model of type 2 diabetes.

This study aimed to assess posttransplant changes in insulin sensitivity and β-cell function of pancreas transplant recipients according to the type of diabetes mellitus (DM) and the pretransplant insulin sensitivity measured by the Matsuda Index (MI).

Seong Jun Lim

Division of Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation,
Department of Surgery,
Asan Medical Center,
Division of Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation, Department of Surgery, Asan Medical Center

University of Ulsan College of Medicine

Robot-Assisted Kidney Transplantation

Seong Jun Lim

Division of Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation,Department of Surgery,Asan Medical Center,Division of Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation, Department of Surgery, Asan Medical Center

University of Ulsan College of Medicine

Robot-Assisted Kidney Transplantation

Division of Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation,
Department of Surgery,
Asan Medical Center,
Division of Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation, Department of Surgery, Asan Medical Center