Effect of lymph leakage on renal allograft outcome from living donors

Abstract

Lymph leakage is a cause of prolonged fluid discharge in renal transplant patients. Lymph leakage during early post-transplantation is responsible for extracting immune substances; therefore, it may play a role in prognosis of the transplanted kidney. In this study, we aimed to investigate the effects of lymph leakage on different factors that play significant roles in renal allograft outcome. During the present case-control study, we evaluated 62 renal allograft recipients in which 31 subjects were complicated with lymph leakage and enrolled as the study group. The other 31 subjects were included in the control group who did not experience any lymph leakage during their post-transplantation period. All kidneys were transplanted from living donors. We investigated and compared the renal allograft rejection rate, hospitalization duration, serum urea, creatinine (Cr) and cyclosporine (CsA) levels, antithymoglobin (ATG) administration and treatment duration between the study and the control groups. There were no significant difference in the urea and Cr levels between the two groups (P >0.05). Early (one week) and late (one month) serum CsA levels of the study group were significantly higher than in the control group (P = 0.005 and P = 0.006). The number of days in which ATG receivers responded to therapy was significantly lower for the control group (P = 0.008). 21.93% of the study group subjects experienced allograft rejection, while this rejection probability was 28.38% for the control group (P = 0.799). Lymph leakage has no prominent role in renal function, which is estimated by Cr and urea levels in patients' serum during the days after transplantation. CsA level was higher in patients with lymph leakage, and all cases of allograft rejection were in the subjects with lymph leakage.