Pancreas-Kidney Transplantation: Do We Know the Frequency of Clinical Complications?

The objective of this study was to describe the most common medical complications in simultaneous pancreas-kidney recipients in our center.

Retrospective and descriptive study of complications observed in a series of 73 simultaneous pancreas-kidney transplant recipients, which included 54 men and 19 women with an average age of 40.6 years, between February 2009 and April 2019. The study assessed the incidence of cytopenia, viral infections, tumors, and graft rejection. Frequency tables were created for each complication in the analysis.

Cytopenia was the most common complication, either by itself or associated with a different complication, and it was found in 23.3% of all patients. The most common infection was cytomegalovirus, which was in 55.6% of all 9 patients who presented infections in spite of universal prophylaxis with valganciclovir, followed by herpes virus (11.1%), papillomavirus (11.1%), and polyoma BK virus (22.2%). Regarding tumors, the number of patients who presented this complication was low; 2 gynecologic tumors were detected (cervical intracellular neoplasia and one ovarian tumor), and 1 case of skin tumor was also observed. There were 3 cases of acute rejection, which represents 4.1% of all patients. Rejection was cellular and steroid-sensitive except for 1 case that was humoral, with good response to treatment.

In spite of the doses of immunosuppressive drugs received by these patients, the incidence of infections was low, and cytomegalovirus was the most common infection. As a consequence of the drugs administered, virtually all patients developed cytopenia. The number of tumors observed in this series was low in spite of the immunosuppressive treatment.