Topical formulation identified for prolonged graft survival in corneal transplants

Main Category: Transplants / Organ Donations
Also Included In: Eye Health / Blindness
Article Date: 20 Aug 2013 - 1:00 PDT Current ratings for:
Topical formulation identified for prolonged graft survival in corneal transplants

Argos Therapeutics Inc., a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development and commercialization of therapies that modulate the immune system to treat cancer, infectious diseases, transplant rejection, autoimmune and inflammatory diseases, has announced the publication of key findings on its soluble recombinant human CD83 protein (sCD83) in cornea transplants. The study, conducted in rodents, demonstrates that CD83 can modulate the immune system and promote graft survival.

The study, which was published in the August 15th print issue of the Journal of Immunology, is a follow on to previous heart and kidney transplant studies using systemic administration of sCD83 in rodents. The current study, however, demonstrated that topical administration in the form of eye drops prolonged graft survival in the high risk corneal transplant mouse model system.

"Our previous studies in rodent model systems of solid organ transplantation involved short-term systemic delivery of sCD83, however, this is the first study demonstrating graft survival benefit after topical application at the graft-host interface," said Charles Nicolette, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer and Vice President of Research and Development of Argos Therapeutics. "These results are very encouraging and reinforce our continued efforts to advance sCD83 into human clinical development. In some transplant settings, topical administration represents a relatively non-invasive alternative to systemic administration which may not only promote graft survival, but could possibly minimize long-term side effects such as those associated with chronic immunosuppressive drugs currently used."

More than 40,000 cornea transplants are performed per year in North America, with a one year graft survival rate of 90% and a 15 year survival rate of 55%. If the cornea was previously damaged due to chemical or thermal burns, herpes infections or transplant rejections, then the one-year survival rate of the graft drops to 50%. In past clinical studies, irreversible rejection is the largest cause of corneal graft failure in the majority of cases.

Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release. Click 'references' tab above for source.
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Topical Application of Soluble CD83 Induces IDO-Mediated Immune Modulation, Increases Foxp3+ T Cells, and Prolongs Allogeneic Corneal Graft Survival

The Journal of Immunology, Published online July 12, 2013, doi: 10.4049/?jimmunol.1201531 and in print on August 15, 2013 vol. 191 no. 4 1965-1975

Felix Bock, Susanne Rössner, Jasmine Onderka, Matthias Lechmann, Maria Teresa Pallotta, Francesca Fallarino, Louis Boon, Charles Nicolette, Mark A. DeBenedette, Irina Y. Tcherepanova?, Ursula Grohmann, Alexander Steinkasserer, Claus Cursiefen and Elisabeth Zinser

Argos Therapeutics

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Physician continuity after patients leave hospital for heart failure can help survival rates

Main Category: Primary Care / General Practice
Also Included In: Cardiovascular / Cardiology
Article Date: 19 Aug 2013 - 9:00 PDT Current ratings for:
Physician continuity after patients leave hospital for heart failure can help survival rates

Patients with heart failure who see a physician in the first month after leaving hospital are more likely to survive than those who do not see a doctor, reports a new study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). The effect is slightly more pronounced in patients who see their regular physician rather than an unfamiliar physician.

In the United States and Canada, more than $20 billion is spent every year on patients who are readmitted to hospital within 30 days after discharge. Heart failure is one of the most common reasons for hospitalization and has a high risk of readmission and early death.

To determine whether continuity of care resulted in better outcomes for patients with heart failure, researchers looked at data on all adults aged 20 years and over in Alberta who were discharged after hospitalization for heart failure. Patients were elderly with various health issues and had used the health care system in the year before their hospitalization for heart failure.

"Intuitively, one might consider physician continuity important for heart-failure patients discharged from hospital, given their age, high comorbidity burdens and complex therapy regimens," writes Dr. Finlay McAlister, University of Alberta, Edmonton, with coauthors. "However, a robust evidence base and multiple guidelines with consistent messaging on key management principles have made physician continuity potentially less important."

Of the total 24 373 discharged patients, 5336 (22%) did not see a physician within the first month, 16 855 (69%) saw a familiar physician (one they had seen at least twice in the year prior) and 2182 (9%) saw an unfamiliar physician. The researchers found that patients who saw a familiar physician had a lower risk of urgent readmission and death compared with patients who saw an unfamiliar physician or who did not visit a doctor.

"Early follow-up was associated with a lower risk of death or urgent readmission over 6 months, compared with no visits in the first month after discharge, regardless of whether the follow-up was with familiar or unfamiliar physicians. However, when we examined follow-up patterns throughout the 6 months after discharge, continuity with a familiar physician was associated with a significantly lower risk of death or readmission than follow-up with an unfamiliar physician, with similar effect estimates for specialist and nonspecialist follow-up," the authors write.

"The absolute reduction of 3% to 8% in risk of death or urgent readmission ... observed over 3?"12 months in association with follow-up in the first month after discharge was in the same range as the absolute benefits seen in placebo-controlled randomized trials of angiotensin-converting-enzyme inhibitor or b-blocker therapy. ... Thus, we believe that physicians should strive to optimize continuity with their heart-failure patients after discharge and that strategies are needed in the health care system to ensure early follow-up after discharge with the patient's regular physician," the authors conclude.

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2 miRNAs found to correlate with survival in urinary bladder cancer

Main Category: Urology / Nephrology
Also Included In: Cancer / Oncology
Article Date: 19 Aug 2013 - 1:00 PDT Current ratings for:
2 miRNAs found to correlate with survival in urinary bladder cancer

German researchers have identified four biomarkers that correctly determine malignancy of urinary bladder cancers and contribute to the accurate prediction of patient outcomes. Their results are published in the September issue of The Journal of Molecular Diagnostics.

Current prognosticators of bladder cancer, such as tumor grade, stage, size, and number of foci, have limited usefulness for clinicians since they do not accurately reflect clinical outcomes. Therefore, investigators have been searching for new biomarkers with better diagnostic and prognostic capabilities. Focusing on the role of microRNAs (miRNAs), small non-coding RNAs, researchers have identified four miRNAs that together perfectly discriminated between nonmalignant and malignant tissue, including one alone that classified 81% of the samples correctly. Levels of two miRNAs correlated with overall survival time.

Urinary bladder cancer is the fourth most common cancer in the West. According to the National Cancer Institute, it is estimated that in the United States 72,570 individuals will be diagnosed with and 15,210 will die of cancer of the urinary bladder in 2013. At presentation, in 75% of patients the cancers are confined to the mucosa or submucosa (known as non-muscle invasive bladder cancer, NMIBC), whereas in 25% of cases the cancers have already invaded nearby muscle (muscle-invasive bladder cancer, MIBC).

In a series of experiments, investigators analyzed bladder tissue from patients with NMIBC, MIBC, and nonmalignant bladders. After screening 723 miRNAs by microarray, they selected a subset of 15 distinctively deregulated miRNAs for further validation by real-time quantitative PCR. Seven miRNAs were found to be up-regulated, and eight were down-regulated in malignant bladder tissue samples compared to healthy tissue. Four miRNAs were expressed differently in bladder cancers that invaded muscle compared to those that did not. With one exception, no correlation was found between tumor stage and miRNA levels.

When all 15 of the selected miRNAs were considered together, they correctly classified 100% of tissues as either normal or malignant. Further analysis identified four miRNAs that led to 100% correct classification, and one miRNA (miR-130b) that by itself had an 81% accuracy rate. "These results underline the great potential of miRNAs to serve as diagnostic markers, as previously noted for other urological tumors," says lead investigator Klaus Jung, MD, the Department of Urology at the University Hospital Charité, Berlin and the Berlin Institute for Urologic Research.

The investigators found that tumor grading could not be correlated with overall survival. Yet, they were able to find two miRNAs that significantly correlated with survival: miR-141 and miR-205. miR-141 showed a trend (P=0.08) of being able to stratify patients with muscle-invasive tumors into two groups with different overall survival times. "This finding could be of clinical importance, but these results must be interpreted cautiously," says Dr. Jung. "However, previously published studies underline the possible prognostic potential of miRNAs to predict progression and disease-specific or overall survival in bladder cancer patients."

miRNAs are small non-coding RNAs that contain between 19 and 24 nucleotides. miRNAs regulate gene expression by degrading messenger RNAs or impairing their translation. In recent years there has been a growing interest in miRNAs as potential diagnostic and/or prognostic biomarkers in cancers and other diseases.

Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release. Click 'references' tab above for source.
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miRNA Profiling Identifies Candidate miRNAs for Bladder Cancer Diagnosis and Clinical Outcome

Nadine Ratert , Hellmuth-Alexander Meyer , Monika Jung , Poline Lioudmer , Hans-Joachim Mollenkopf , Ina Wagner , Kurt Miller , Ergin Kilic , Andreas Erbersdobler , Steffen Weikert , Klaus Jung; doi:10.1016/j.jmoldx.2013.05.008

Elsevier Health Sciences

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Leap in survival rates for childhood leukaemia patients with rare genetic abnormality

Main Category: Lymphoma / Leukemia / Myeloma
Article Date: 15 Aug 2013 - 2:00 PDT Current ratings for:
Leap in survival rates for childhood leukaemia patients with rare genetic abnormality

A pioneering genetic study means that children with a rare subtype of leukaemia have 75% less chance of their leukaemia recurring.

A study by Newcastle University scientists, published online on August 12th in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, has shown that lives have already been saved as a result of identifying children carrying a chromosomal abnormality known as iAMP21 and giving these patients a very intensive treatment regimen.

Overall survival for acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) patients, a cancer of the white blood cells, is now very high, with up to 90% of children being cured. A minority of patients, however, still do not respond to standard treatment.

A decade ago, the same scientists, funded by the blood cancer charity Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research, discovered the genetic error known as iAMP21. This abnormality occurs when parts of chromosome 21 - one of 23 pairs of chromosomes that contain our genetic instructions - are copied and shuffled around, resulting in extra copies of some genes. The researchers found that this abnormality was present in around 2% of children diagnosed with ALL and that it gave them a much greater chance of suffering a relapse.

The team, led by Professor Christine Harrison and Professor Anthony Moorman from the Leukaemia Research Cytogenetics Group, tracked the progress of patients with iAMP21 using samples from clinical trials between 1997 and 2002. They found that more than 80% of patients with iAMP21 had relapsed, compared to less than for 25% for children overall. The long-term survival for the iAMP21 group was also much lower.

Since 2003, bone marrow samples from every child diagnosed with ALL have been tested for the presence of iAMP21 using a genetic test known as 'fluorescence in situ hybridisation' (FISH), which binds glowing tags to DNA and "lights-up" the abnormal sequences. Children with iAMP21 registered on the UKALL2003 trial, which was funded by Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research and the Medical Research Council, were immediately recommended for treatment using a very intensive protocol.

The results of the UKALL2003 trial show that if children with iAMP21 are treated with intensive chemotherapy they have a dramatically reduced risk of relapse. In addition the proportion surviving for five years or more increased to nearly 90%.

Anthony Moorman, Professor of Genetic Epidemiology at Newcastle University, said: "Although using the presence of genetic abnormalities to guide treatment is not new within childhood leukaemia, such a clear demonstration of its beneficial impact on survival is extremely rare. In time we may be able to design drugs to actually target the iAMP21 abnormality, sparing these children from toxic treatment."

Professor Chris Bunce, Research Director at Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research, said: "By establishing how different genetic abnormalities found in leukaemia cells dictate how well the child will respond to treatment, we can identify high-risk patients early on. These new results demonstrate the huge potential of personalised medicine."

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The report is published online in the Journal of Clinical Oncology under the title, ‘Risk directed treatment intensification significantly reduces the risk of relapse among children and adolescents with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia and intrachromosomal amplification of chromosome 21: A comparison of MRC ALL97/99 and UKALL2003 trials’. Principal authors: Prof Anthony V Moorman, Professor Ajay Vora and Prof Christine J Harrison, Leukaemia Research Cytogenetics Group, Northern Institute for Cancer Research, Newcastle University, UK, doi: 10.1200/JCO.2013.48.9377

Newcastle University

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Earlier surgical correction of heart valve disorder associated with greater long-term survival, lower risk of heart failure risk

Main Category: Cardiovascular / Cardiology
Article Date: 13 Aug 2013 - 13:00 PDT Current ratings for:
Earlier surgical correction of heart valve disorder associated with greater long-term survival, lower risk of heart failure risk

In a study that included patients with mitral valve regurgitation due to a condition known as flail mitral valve leaflets, performance of early surgical correction compared with initial medical management was associated with greater long-term survival and lower risk of heart failure, according to a study in the August 14 issue of JAMA.

"Degenerative mitral regurgitation [backflow of blood from the left ventricle to the left atrium due to mitral valve insufficiency] is common and can be surgically repaired in the vast majority of patients, improving symptoms and restoring normal life expectancy. Despite the safety and efficacy of contemporary surgical correction, an ongoing international debate persists regarding the need for early intervention in patients without American College of Cardiology (ACC)/American Heart Association (AHA) guideline class I triggers (no or minimal symptoms and absence of left ventricular dysfunction). This is in part propagated by discordant views of the prognostic consequences of uncorrected severe mitral regurgitation; considered as benign by those supporting medical watchful waiting (nonsurgical observation until a distinct event is encountered) vs. conveying excess mortality and morbidity (including heart failure and atrial fibrillation) by those advocating early surgical intervention," according to background information in the article.

To understand the comparative effectiveness of early surgery vs. initial medical management strategies, Rakesh M. Suri, M.D., D.Phil., of the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, Rochester, Minn., and colleagues conducted a study to ascertain the comparative effectiveness of initial medical management (nonsurgical observation) vs. early mitral valve surgery following the diagnosis of mitral regurgitation due to flail leaflets (an abnormality of the mitral valve in which a portion of the valve has lost its normal support). For the study, the researchers used data from the Mitral Regurgitation International Database (MIDA) registry, which includes 2,097 patients with flail mitral valve regurgitation (1980-2004) receiving routine cardiac care from 6 tertiary centers (France, Italy, Belgium, and the United States). Of 1,021 patients with mitral regurgitation without ACC and AHA guideline class I triggers, 575 patients were initially medically managed and 446 underwent mitral valve surgery within 3 months following detection.

Within 3 months following diagnosis, 8 patients died, 5 (1.1 percent) after early surgery vs. 3 (0.5 percent) during initial medical management; 9 patients developed heart failure, 4 (0.9 percent) after early surgery vs. 5 (0.9 percent) during initial medical management; and 30 patients developed new-onset atrial fibrillation, 6.2 percent after early surgery vs. 1.2 percent during initial medical management.

Ninety-eight percent of patients were followed up from diagnosis until death or at least 5 years. A total of 319 deaths were observed during an average follow-up time of 10.3 years. "Survival among the entire unmatched cohort for early surgery was 95 percent at 5 years, 86 percent at 10 years, 63 percent at 20 years vs. 84 percent at 5 years, 69 percent at 10 years, and 41 percent at 20 years for initial medical management, favoring early surgery," the authors write. Early surgical correction of mitral valve regurgitation was associated with a 5-year reduction in mortality of 53 percent.

With class II triggers (atrial fibrillation or pulmonary hypertension), survival was again better with early surgery, both overall and in the matched cohort at 10 years.

During follow-up, 167 patients incurred at least 1 incident episode of heart failure representing a rate of 16 percent at 10 years and 27 percent at 20 years. In the overall cohort, heart failure was less frequent after early surgery (7 percent for early surgery vs. 23 percent for initial medical management at 10 years and 10 percent for early surgery vs. 35 percent for initial medical management at 20 years), with a heart failure risk reduction of approximately 60 percent.

Reduction in late-onset atrial fibrillation was not observed.

"These findings emanate from institutions that together provide a very high rate of mitral valve repair (>90 percent) with low operative mortality, emphasizing that such results might also be achieved in routine practice at many advanced repair centers," the authors write. "The advantages associated with early surgical correction of mitral valve regurgitation were confirmed in both unmatched and matched populations, using multiple statistical methods."

In an accompanying editorial, Catherine M. Otto, M.D., of the University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, comments on how the findings of this study may influence patient care.

"The study group is atypical compared with most patients with chronic severe mitral regurgitation seen in clinical practice who are referred for surgical intervention at symptom onset or when serial imaging shows early left ventricular (LV) dysfunction. In patients with severe mitral regurgitation due to mitral valve prolapse, early surgery is reasonable if surgical risk is low and the likelihood of successful valve repair is high, which is often the case for patients with a flail leaflet; the new data support this recommendation."

"However, if surgical risk is high or if the likelihood of valve repair is low, it remains uncertain whether early surgical intervention is appropriate in the asymptomatic patient with severe mitral regurgitation due to a flail leaflet when LV size and systolic function are normal. Although the majority of these patients will develop clear indications for valve surgery within 2 years, it may be reasonable to postpone the risks of having an intervention and having a prosthetic valve as long as possible."

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Article - JAMA. 2013;310(6):609-616

Editorial - JAMA. 2013;310(6):587-588

JAMA

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Liver function regenerated and survival extended in mice with hepatic failure using human stem cell-derived hepatocytes

Main Category: Liver Disease / Hepatitis
Also Included In: Stem Cell Research
Article Date: 30 Jul 2013 - 0:00 PDT Current ratings for:
Liver function regenerated and survival extended in mice with hepatic failure using human stem cell-derived hepatocytes

Researchers have generated functional hepatocytes from human stem cells, transplanted them into mice with acute liver injury, and shown the ability of these stem-cell derived human liver cells to function normally and increase survival of the treated animals. This promising advance in the development of cell-based therapies to treat liver failure resulting from injury or disease relied on the development of scalable, reproducible methods to produce stem cell-derived hepatocytes in bioreactors, as described in an article in Stem Cells and Development, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available free on the Stem Cells and Development website.

Massoud Vosough and coauthors demonstrate a large-scale, integrated manufacturing strategy for generating functional hepatocytes in a single suspension culture grown in a scalable stirred bioreactor. In the article "Generation of Functional Hepatocyte-Like Cells from Human Pluripotent Stem Cells in a Scalable Suspension Culture" the authors describe the method used for scale-up, differentiation of the pluripotent stem cells into liver cells, and characterization and purification of the hepatocytes based on their physiological properties and the expression of liver cell biomarkers.

David C. Hay, MRC Centre for Regenerative Medicine, University of Edinburgh, U.K., comments on the importance of Vosough et al.'s contribution to the scientific literature in his editorial in Stem Cells and Development entitled "Rapid and Scalable Human Stem Cell Differentiation: Now in 3D." The researchers "developed a system for mass manufacture of stem cell derived hepatocytes in numbers that would be useful for clinical application," creating possibilities for future "immune matched cell based therapies," says Hay. Such approaches could be used to correct mutated genes in stem cell populations prior to differentiation and transplantation, he adds.

"The elephant in the room for stem cell therapy rarely even acknowledged let alone addressed in the literature is that of scalable production of cells for translational application," says Editor-in-Chief Graham C. Parker, PhD, research professor, Carman and Ann Adams Department of Pediatrics, Wayne State University School of Medicine. "Baharvand's groups' landmark publication not only demonstrates but exquisitely describes the methodology required to scale up stem cell populations for clinical application with a rigor to satisfy necessary manufacturing standards."

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No improvement seen in HIV-associated lymphoma survival during the antiretroviral therapy era

Main Category: Lymphoma / Leukemia / Myeloma
Also Included In: HIV / AIDS
Article Date: 30 Jul 2013 - 0:00 PDT Current ratings for:
No improvement seen in HIV-associated lymphoma survival during the antiretroviral therapy era

Stable survival rates were observed for HIV-associated lymphoma patients during the antiretroviral therapy (ART) era in the US, according to a new study published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Studies have shown that HIV infection increases the risk of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) and Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) and that incidence for many lymphoma types has not decreased in the ART era. Furthermore, lymphoma is the most frequent cancer-related cause of death among HIV-infected persons. However, trends in presentation and survival have not been investigated among HIV-associated lymphoma patients in routine care since the beginning of the ART era.

Satish Gopal, M.D., M.P.H., from the Program in Global Oncology at the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center of the University of North Carolina, and colleagues compared differences in presentation and survival, across histologic subtypes and diagnosis years, among HIV-infected lymphoma patients. They also examined predictors of death in this population. Data from 476 HIV-associated lymphoma patients living in the US who were diagnosed with various types of lymphoma including HL, diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), Burkitt lymphoma (BL), primary central nervous system lymphoma (PCNSL), and other types of NHL, between 1996 and 2010 were analyzed using various statistical methods.

Their results demonstrate that HIV-associated lymphoma is heterogeneous and changing since the ART era began. Clinical presentations across the different lymphoma subtypes was highly variable during the study period (79 HL, 201 DLBCL, 56 BL, 54 PCNSL, and 86 with other NHL). Histologic shifts in the proportion of BL vs other NHL subtypes is increasing consistent with other reports. Data showed that more recently diagnosed patients were older and more likely to be male, of nonwhite/nonblack ethnicity (primarily Latino patients), to be men who have sex with men, and to have prior AIDS-related illness. They were also more likely to be on ART at lymphoma diagnosis with higher CD4 counts and better HIV control. The authors also report that more recent diagnosis year was not associated with decreased mortality and that 61.6% of patients with HIV-associated HL were alive 5 years after lymphoma diagnosis, compared with 50.0% for BL, 44.1% for DLBCL, 43.3% for other NHL, and 22.8% for PCNSL. Of note, lymphomas occurring on ART were associated with a doubling of mortality, which may suggest important biologic differences between tumors developing on and off ART, although these results require confirmation.

Gopal and colleagues conclude, "These results highlight an ongoing need to elucidate lymphoma biology and optimize treatments for this challenging population to reduce deaths from one of the leading causes of mortality in the modern ART era."

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In an accompanying editorial, Kieron Dunleavy, M.D., and Wyndham H. Wilson, M.D., Ph.D., from the Metabolism Branch of the Center for Cancer Research at the National Cancer Institute, state the findings reflect the shifting demographics of the HIV epidemic in the US. However, the shift towards more biologically favorable and curable types of lymphoma has not resulted in improved survival over the study period. They assert, "In conclusion, because HIV-associated lymphomas are potentially as curable as those arising in HIV-negative patients, it is critical that they be approached with the same care as HIV negative cases."

Journal of the National Cancer Institute

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Obese kidney failure patients receive survival benefit from transplantation

Main Category: Transplants / Organ Donations
Also Included In: Urology / Nephrology;  Obesity / Weight Loss / Fitness
Article Date: 25 Jul 2013 - 0:00 PDT Current ratings for:
Obese kidney failure patients receive survival benefit from transplantation

Most obese individuals with kidney failure can prolong their lives by receiving a kidney transplant, although this survival benefit is lower in severely obese individuals. That's the conclusion of a new study published in the American Journal of Transplantation. The findings will hopefully decrease differences in access to transplantation for obese patients.

Obesity is increasing in patients with kidney failure. In some studies, obese kidney failure patients who are on dialysis have a lower risk of dying prematurely than non-obese patients. In contrast, obese kidney transplant recipients have a higher risk of dying prematurely than non-obese recipients. Therefore determining the survival benefit of transplantation in obese transplant recipients is an important issue.

Using data from the United States between 1995 and 2007, John Gill, MD, MS, of the University of British Columbia, in Vancouver, and his colleagues determined the risk of premature death in transplant recipients grouped by body mass index (BMI) compared with transplant candidates with the same BMI who were on the transplant waiting list. The analysis included 208,498 patients, and obesity was defined as a BMI of 30 kg/m2 or higher.

Among the major findings:

Obese patients with a BMI of 30 to 39 kg/m2 derived a similar survival advantage from transplantation as non-obese patients, which equated to more than a 66 percent reduced risk of dying within one year of transplantation.Obese patients with a BMI of 40 or higher derived a lower survival advantage from transplantation (a 48 percent reduced risk of dying within one year), and a survival advantage was uncertain in Black patients with a BMI of 40 or higher.Differences in obese compared with non-obese patients were not as profound with transplantations using kidneys from live donors.

The risk of dying early after transplantation was greater in obese compared with non-obese patients.

"Our study shows that obese patients derive a survival advantage from transplantation, and obesity should not exclude patients from consideration of transplantation," said Dr. Gill. "Also, improved early post-transplant care may help reduce the early risk of death in obese patients, and living donor transplantation may be a useful strategy to mitigate the risks of transplantation in obese transplant candidates."

Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release. Click 'references' tab above for source.
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Gill et al. The Survival Benefit of Kidney Transplantation in Obese Patients, American Journal of Transplantation; Published Online: July 25, 2013 (DOI: 10.1111/ajt.12331).

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