Pathology of Renal Transplantation

Renal transplantation has become the treatment of choice for patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) resulting from a variety of causes. The short-term patient and graft outcomes have improved markedly over the recent years (Hariharan et al., 2000). Renal transplant recipients are subject to all those diseases which affect the general population. In addition, like all other allograft recipients, renal transplant recipients are also susceptible to a variety of unique pathological lesions not seen in the non-transplant population. These lesions may involve the transplanted organ or other native organs/systems of the transplant recipients. The focus of this chapter will be on the major pathological processes affecting the kidney allograft itself and are diagnosed on renal allograft biopsy. In this chapter we will present a brief but comprehensive overview of the pathology of the renal allograft seen on allograft biopsies supplemented by representative pictures.