WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – For the sixth consecutive year, the Abdominal Organ Transplant Program at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center has performed more than 100 transplants, ranking them among the top 30 most active kidney transplant centers and top 15 most active pancreas transplant centers in the country.
In 2007, a total of 166 patients received transplants, a 20 percent increase over 2006. Transplants included 147 kidney transplants, 19 kidney-pancreas and two sequential pancreas after kidney transplants. Among the 147 kidney transplants, the patient survival rate is 99 percent (100 percent for living donor, and 98 percent for deceased donor kidney recipients).
“Our program had some ‘firsts’ this year,” said Robert Stratta, M.D., director of the Abdominal Organ Transplant Program. “We performed our first identical twin living donor kidney transplant, in which the recipient is not on any immunosuppressant medications. We also performed our first successful kidney transplant in an HIV-positive patient, and a number of successful transplants in highly-sensitized patients using a desensitization regimen post transplant to minimize or prevent rejection.”
Within the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients database, which compares Wake Forest Baptist’s program with regional and national data, the Abdominal Organ Transplant Program has higher than expected patient and graft survival rates, lower than expected waiting times and waiting list mortality, higher rates of organ acceptance, higher rates of transplantation (particularly in the elderly), greater utilization of expanded criteria donor kidneys and improved waiting list turnover.
Media Relations
Jonnie Rohrer: news@wakehealth.edu, 336-713-4587