Long-term outcomes of kidney transplants with multiple renal arteries: a retrospective study

The aim of this study was to investigate whether kidney transplantations performed using grafts with multiple arteries negatively affected renal function or increased the risk of vascular or urologic complications.

Among 249 kidney transplant patient followed for at least 1 year between 2000 and 2005, we retrospectively evaluated their donor renal artery anatomy to compare postoperative vascular and urologic complications: creatinine clearance at 1, 2, and 5 years, as well as graft survival at 3 and 5 years.

While 214 (85.9%) displayed a single artery (group 1), 35 (14.1%) showed multiple renal arteries (group 2). Thirty-one of the group 2 allografts had two, three donors had three, and one had four arteries. The postoperative vascular and urologic complications and the creatinine clearance values at 1, 2, and 5 years of both groups were similar. The 3- and 5-year graft survivals among group 1 were 95% and 90%, whereas those of group 2 were 94% and 91% respectively (P < .05).

Our study indicated that multiple renal arteries did not adversely affect postoperative urologic or vascular complications or kidney allograft or patient survival compared with single renal artery cases.