Single segment of spleen autotransplantation, after splenectomy for trauma, can restore splenic functions

Splenectomy is sometimes necessary after abdominal trauma, but splenectomized patients are at risk of sepsis due to impaired immunological functions. To overcome this risk, autotransplantation of the spleen by using a new technique has been proposed, but so far, a demonstration of functionality of the transplanted tissue is lacking.

We therefore evaluated 5 patients who underwent a splenic autotransplant in comparison with 5 splenectomized patients without splenic autotransplant and 7 normal subjects.

We confirmed that the patients not undergoing autotransplantation, when compared to normal subjects, had a higher platelet count, higher percentage of micronucleated reticulocytes (p = 0.002), increased levels of naive B lymphocytes (p = 0.01), a defect of class-switched memory (p = 0.001) and class-unswitched memory B cells (p = 0.002), and increased levels of PD1 on T lymphocytes CD8+ (p = 0.08). In contrast, no significant differences for any of the abovementioned parameters were recorded between patients who underwent spleen autotransplantation and normal subjects.

These findings suggest that splenic autotransplantation is able to restore an adequate hemocatheretic activity as well as recover the immunological deficit after splenectomy.