Studies on eleven kidney transplants from non-heart-beating donors

This study was performed to analyze postoperative courses and complications, retrospectively, following transplants from non-heart-beating donors and to examine the correlation between early graft function and clinical parameters. We experienced 11 cases of kidney transplants from non-heart-beating donors during the period from April 1995 to May 2003. Warm ischemic time was less than 30 min in all cases, and total ischemic time ranged from 8.4 hours to 27.9 hours. Rejection reactions occurred in seven cases, two of which were vascular rejections. Infectious disease complications included CMV in two cases, interstitial pneumonia in one case and fungal infection in one case. One patient died from interstitial pneumonia, and three patients had to be restarted on dialysis due to loss of function of the grafted kidney. The remaining seven patients all made full recoveries. All of the 16 patients who underwent living related kidney transplantations during the same period made full recoveries. Both the donor's gender and the latest creatinine level of the donor influenced the posttransplant dialysis period. The posttransplant dialysis period significantly influenced the creatinine level one month after transplant. These results suggest that patients who undergo kidney transplants from non-heart-beating donors have higher rates of complications than patients who undergo living related kidney transplantation. It is important that, in cases where the donor's creatinine level is high, especially when the donor is male, the kidney is carefully retrieved and transported to the recipent hospital to shorten the ischemic period as much as possible.