[Can the quality of renal grafts be judged on basis of the organ donors?].

The aim of this study is to find brain dead organ donor parameters able to predict the functional value of a kidney graft after transplantation. It is a retrospective, multicenter study, set in the east of France (Besançon, Nancy, Reims, Strasbourg). All donors harvested over an 18 month period (n = 169), and kidney grafts transplanted in a recipient in the same region (n = 298) are studied. Recipients from another region receiving a kidney graft as well as kidney grafts transplanted in other regions are not studied. Parameters studied in the donor are: age, sex, etiology of brain death, vascular disease, hemodynamic stability, use of epinephrine, diuresis, creatinine level, graft preservation solution. Parameters studied in the recipient are: age, sex, first transplantation or not, cold ischemia duration, warm ischemia duration, early post-transplantation diuresis and creatinine level evolution, dialysis requirement, immunosuppression, creatinine level at 1, 6 and 12 month. During the early post transplantation period, 264 recipients recovered diuresis, and the creatinine level felt in 246 cases. 31 patients required dialysis. 12 months after transplantation, 128 patients had a normal graft function (creatinine level < 15 mg/l). No parameter in the donor was found able to predict kidney graft function after transplantation. In fact, it is the amount of several risk factors due to donor data, organ retrieval and preservation, and kidney transplantation which is responsible for the early graft function. This points out the importance of being very careful when there is already a risk factor due to old age or vascular disease.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)