Objective: To explore the possible causes of transplant renal artery stenosis (TRAS) in cadaveric transplant recipients.
Method: We retrospectively analyzed multiple factors that may contribute to TRAS (including the patients' age, presence of diabetes, cold ischemic time, acute rejection episode, cytomegalovirus infection, serum cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, pre-operative dialysis, number of donor renal arteries, which side of donor kidney, type of surgical anastomosis, different protocols of inductive and maintenance drug therapy) in 18 recipients with transplant renal artery stenosis after cadveric renal transplantation from Jan. 2000 to Dec. 2001 in comparison with another 566 non-TRAS recipients who underwent the transplantation during the same period.
Results: There was a higher incidence of acute rejection in the TRAS group than non-TRAS group (66.67% vs 5.48%, P<0.01), and no significant difference was noted between TRAS and non-TRAS cases in terms of the pre-operative dialysis, presence of diabetes, cold ischemic time, number of donor renal arteries, whith side of donor kidney, type of surgical anastomosis, different protocols of inductive and maintenance drug therapy, cytomegalovirus infections and serum and LDL cholesterols.
Conclusion: The occurrence of TRAS in cadaveric allografts is associated with acute graft rejection episode, suggesting the importance of the treatment of acute graft rejection in the prevention of TRAS.