Rehabilitation of ischemically damaged human kidneys by normothermic extracorporal hemoperfusion in situ with oxygenation and leukocyte depletion.

The potential use of donors after cardiac death is an important issue. The crucial point in uncontrolled donors after cardiac death is the warm ischemic time. Definition of the limit of warm ischemic time was 1 of our tasks; an other was to develop a preservation protocol. Five uncontrolled donors kidneys with warm ischemia times up to 80 minutes were exposed to an extracorporal perfusion device for preservation after ischemic damage. We sought to eliminate leukocytes as the main damaging factor in modified donor blood circulating in the device. Recipients of 8 kidneys from this protocol displayed immediate graft function with an average serum creatinine value of 140 +/- 37.9 mmol/L at the end of the second month. Treatment of ischemically damaged kidneys by normothermic extracorporal perfusion with leukocyte depletion before procurement demands further study.