Living-unrelated (paid) renal transplantation--ten years later

Due to the increase of organ shortage and still inadequate development of cadaver transplantation, many end-stage patients from the Balkan region travel mostly to India to buy a kidney. Despite all the ethical dilemmas and discussions, organ sales is present nowdays in Third-World countries. Sixteen patients (13 from Macedonia and 3 from Kosovo, SCG) were observed clinically during a period of 10 years. Recipients of mean age 36.5 years (range 10 to 58) displayed the following underlying diseases: chronic glomerulonephritis (n = 5), urethral valves with reflux (n = 2), ADPKD (n = 1), hypertensive nephropathy (n = 4), lithiasis (n = 1), and unknown cause of ESRD (n = 3). The donor population was young (22 to 29 years). Most patient records did not include data on HLA, cross-match, MLC, kind of surgery, or usual pretransplant workup. The immunosuppressive protocol included CyA, PRED, and AZA or MMF. All transplanted patients were followed on an outpatient basis in our department; patients with complications were hospitalized. The 1, 3, 5, and 10 year Kaplan Meier graft survival rates were 78.6%, 50.2%, 33.3%, and 18.8%, respectively. Seven patients were lost (43.7%), two during the first month after transplantation, two at the end of the first year, and three at 5, 6, and 8 years thereafter. The main reasons for death were severe pulmonary infections with sepsis, hepatitis B with liver cirrhosis, Kala Azar, CMV, and cancer of the colon. Five grafts were lost due to repeated rejection episodes and chronic graft nephropathy. The last three cases remained with good renal function and actual serum creatinine values of 135 +/- 9. In view of this experience, the authors cannot recommend this type of transplantation, not only from the ethical point of view, but also from frequent medical and surgical complications which are sometimes life threatening.