Long Term Follow-Up of Renal Transplant Patients-a Single Center Experience in Iraq

Renal transplantation is considered the optimal form of renal replacement therapy for patients with end stage renal disease. Kidney transplantation was started in Iraq in 1973 at Al-Rasheed military hospital after Jordan in 1972 and Lebanon in 1973. In this study we analyze retrospectively the data of (182) kidney recipient patients selected randomly from 1979 to 1999, including (165) male and (17) female patients. Their age ranging from 18 to 54 years and the follow up period was 0 to 240 months postoperatively. The average duration of dialysis before transplantation was 4 to 5 months. The donors in most instances were live related (89.6%). The immunosuppressive imereg include both double and triple therapy and all episodes of rejection were treated with pulse methyl prednisolon. The patient survival rates at 1, 5 and 10 years were 82.9%, 79.7%, and 71.2% respectively while the graft survival rate at 1, 5 and 10 years were 83.5%, 64.5% and 61.6% respectively. These results were found to be comparable to the average values of Arab countries reported in the survey of Arab Society of Nephrology Renal Transplantation (ASNRT) in 1999. All the medical and surgical complications encountered in our series are described and discussed and the effect of sanction imposed on Iraq is clarified.