Transplantation News

Those on dialysis or who have previously received a kidney transplant face a higher risk for COVID-19-related death after infection due to the way the virus amplifies these patients’ already intense immunophenotypic alterations.

Steroid avoidance can lower the risk of diabetes mellitus after transplant in older patients or those who have higher BMIs when paired with appropriate induction regimens, according to data published in Kidney Medicine.

Despite some progress in achieving equity in kidney care, important disparities – including insurance coverage for chronic kidney disease care and access to transplantation – are impacting underrepresented groups, a speaker said here.

A speculated alternative to the Kidney Allocation System is continuous kidney allocation, which can be designed by simulation optimization, according to a speaker at ASN Kidney Week.

Five years after the Kidney Allocation System was implemented, racial and ethnic disparities decreased in pediatric transplantations but the wait time for kidney transplants increased for pediatric patients of all races and ethnicities.

Even with a waitlist close to 100,000 individuals seeking a kidney transplant, approximately 20% of organs procured are discarded each year.

Patients with AKI may continue treatment with immune checkpoint inhibitors, even if they have experienced immune checkpoint inhibitor-AKI, according to data published in the Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer.

A retrospective cohort study published in the Journal of Investigative Medicine showed 0.32% of renal transplant patients had Nocardia infection and that patients with this infection were at an increased risk for graft failure.

Among patients with end-stage kidney disease, researchers found the same degree of survival benefit from kidney transplant for those with and those without prostate cancer, noting the cancer was linked with modest increases in mortality.

After two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, pediatric transplant patients responded with positive and protective antibody levels with results indicating a “more robust” immune response than that found in adult transplant patients.