Lung transplantation for mechanically ventilated patients

As lung transplantation has become more successful, the selection criteria have broadened; however, some relative contraindications to lung transplantation are controversial. Some programs consider mechanical ventilation to be a major contraindication to lung transplantation because airway colonization with bacteria may lead to nosocomial infection and respiratory muscle deconditioning may necessitate prolonged postoperative ventilatory support. We report our experience of seven double lung transplant procedures on six patients requiring mechanical ventilation. Five patients with cystic fibrosis required preoperative mechanical ventilation for 7 to 19 days (mean, 10.7 days). One patient with acute lung injury required 115 days of preoperative mechanical ventilatory support. Only the latter patient required prolonged (27 days) postoperative mechanical ventilation because of respiratory muscle weakness; the others were extubated in 1 to 19 days (mean, 7.8 days). No early complications related to bacterial infection were seen. Two patients required temporary hemodialysis for transient kidney failure. Three patients had postoperative neurologic residua; one patient had a transient hemiparesis, and seizures developed in two patients. One patient died 3 months after transplantation from severe central nervous system complications with no evidence of pulmonary problems; and two patients died 17 months after transplantation, one of them receiving a second double lung transplant for obliterative bronchiolitis. Except for the patient who required prolonged preoperative ventilatory support, mechanical ventilation did not appear to play a role in the outcome of these patients. The posttransplantation hospital stay and hospital charges for patients requiring pretransplantation ventilatory support were not significantly different from those for other lung transplant recipients.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)