[Assessment of Japanese patients receiving heart transplants overseas]

No heart transplants have been performed in Japan due to various obstacles since the only operation performed in 1968. Since 1981, a number of patients requiring heart transplants have been accepted by foreign transplantation centers in England, the U.S.A., and Germany. This report describes an investigation of the postoperative course of these Japanese heart transplant patients and discusses the problems regarding transplantation in Japan. Of the 21 transplant patients, the diagnosis was dilated cardiomyopathy in 17, restrictive cardiomyopathy in 1, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy in 2, and congenital muscle dystrophy in 1. All patients survived surgery but three died in the long-term period. The causes of death were acute rejection (after 3 months), chronic rejection (after 50 months) and infection (after 30 months). The actuarial survival curve of these patients was 95.0% for one-year survival and 86.4% for three-year survival. The postoperative functional class was NYHA classification I in all patients (100%). Ninety-three percent of patients returned to work. Immunosuppressive therapies included triple drug therapy in 14 patients (66.7%), double drug therapy in 4 (19.0%), ciclosporin alone in 2 (9.5%) and FK506 in 2 (5.0%). The incidence of acute rejection was 1.56 episodes per patient per year within 3 months and 2.9 episodes per patient per year within 1 year. The postoperative courses of Japanese patients who underwent heart transplantation at foreign transplantation centers were satisfactory. These results will encourage heart transplantation in Japan.