What's new--what's hot in clinical science: American Transplant Congress 2004

The American Transplant Congress 2004, held in Boston last May, was the biggest conference in the history of the event, with over 4000 attendees. A wide variety of clinical topics were presented and discussed, all advancing the field of solid organ transplantation. This manuscript will attempt to summarize the presentations at the meeting. Particularly 'hot' clinical topics included the recent passage of a law to increase organ recovery, the use of expanded criteria kidney donors, a new model for the allocation of deceased donor lungs, survival following liver transplantation and its potential effect on liver allocation and the use of novel immunosuppressive drugs.