Does Transplant On The Weekend Affect Outcomes Folllowing Kidney Transplant? A UNOS Analysis.

Abstract

Admission to the hospital on a weekend (WE) has been associated with increased morbidity and mortality for a number of medical and surgical conditions compared with weekday (WD) admissions. These inferior outcomes may in part be related to a reduction in clinical personnel or access to some clinical services on the WE. Deceased donor renal transplants (DDRT) are urgent operations for which a delay in operative starting time will lead to an increase in cold ischemia time, which is associated with an increase in the risk of delayed graft function (DGF). There are few data examining the impact of WE transplant on outcomes following DDRT. Methods: We analyzed outcomes for first time DDRT recipients who received a solitary kidney transplant from 2000- 2010 in the UNOS registry and compared organs transplanted during the WE with those that occurred on a WD and their corresponding outcomes. Follow up data was available through October 2011. Results: Among 97,611 transplants, 26,356 (27%) transplants were performed on a WE. Recipient and donor characteristics are shown in table 1.Table: No Caption available.The incidence of DGF was similar (WD vs. WE: 23.1% vs. 23.2%, p=0.599). Overall graft survival was similar at 1-year (WD vs. WE: 90.56% vs. 90.56%, p=NS) ad 5-years (WD vs. WE: 71.29% vs. 70.82%, p=NS) Conclusion: There are small differences in the types of deceased donor organs utilized on the WE vs. WD, and in the characteristics of recipients who are called in for WE vs. WD transplants, though these differences are unlikely to be of clinical significance. Renal transplants performed over a WE have similar short-term and long-term outcomes compared with renal transplants performed on a WD.