UNOS DonateLife

September 20, 2002

UNOS Researcher Presents Findings on Minority Transplants

Birmingham, Al. -- United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) researcher Wida S. Cherikh, Ph.D. will present the results of studies on access to kidney transplants for African Americans and the benefit of living donation to minorities Friday at the American Society of Minority Health and Transplant Professionals annual meeting in Birmingham, Al. The studies are summarized below. UNOS researchers are indicated with an asterisk.

Decreased Access to Cadaveric Renal Transplants in African Americans: Is sensitization an issue?
Wida S. Cherikh, Ph.D.* and Alan Ting, Ph.D.*.

It has been suggested that one of the reasons African Americans wait longer on average for a kidney transplant is because they had a higher immune sensitization rate, as measured by percent Panel Reactive Antibody (PRA), compared to Caucasians. Researchers examined the proportion of sensitized candidates among Caucasian and African American patients added to the kidney waiting list between 1999 and 2001, adjusting for gender and previous transfusions. The data showed that African Americans had a higher sensitization rate than Caucasians in all analyses, whether stratified by gender, previous transfusions, or whether they were waiting for a first or repeat transplant. The researchers concluded that African Americans tend to be more sensitized than Caucasians. Sensitization appears to be a factor in decreased access to kidney transplantation because of a greater probability of a positive crossmatch, contributing to longer waiting times for African Americans.

Trends in Living Donor Kidney Transplants: Do Minorities Benefit?
Wida S. Cherikh, Ph.D.*, Mary D. Ellison, Ph.D.* and Clive O. Callender, M.D.

Living donor kidney transplantation has become an alternative to cadaveric transplantation as the median waiting time for cadaveric kidney transplants has become longer, especially for minorities. The overall proportion of living donor kidney transplants has doubled from 20 percent in 1988 to 40 percent in 2000. In a comparative study of graft outcome in minority living-donor kidney recipients, researchers found that living donor transplants resulted in a significantly lower incidence of return to dialysis within seven days of transplant and rejection, and therefore better long-term graft survival than cadaveric kidney transplants for recipients of any minority ethnic group. Although most living donors were related to the recipient, living unrelated transplant recipients appeared to enjoy similar graft survival benefit as living related transplant recipients.