Improved kidney graft survival in Eurotransplant by HLA-DR matching and prospectively given blood transfusions.

CADAVERIC kidney graft survival is influenced by many different factors. Two such factors are matching for the HLA-DR determinants between donor and recipient and blood transfusion(s) given to the recipient before transplantation. Indeed, recent reports have shown that matching for the HLA-DR determinants and the effect of pre-transplant blood transfusions play an important role in predicting kidney graft outcome in human cadaveric renal transplantation 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Most of these retrospective studies were critisized because of selection criteria, insufficient accuracy, heterogeneity, patient management etc. To tackle the problem of retrospective studies as many patients as possible on the Eurotransplant waiting list were typed prospectively for the HLA-DR determinants. Kidney donors were typed before or at time of transplantation and are therefore considered as prospective.