Incidence of Post-transplant Malignancy after Renal Transplantation: Single Center Analysis

Abstract

Background: Immunosuppression after kidney transplantation is associated with increased risk of malignancy, which has become the second most common cause of death among kidney transplant recipients. In this review, we report the incidence of malignancies after kidney transplantation in a single center and evaluate the incidence, characteristics, relationship to immunosuppressive drugs and discuss what clinicians must consider during a follow-up of patients after kidney transplantation.Methods: Between May 1978 and September 2013, a total of 748 kidney transplant patients who were able to undergo a follow-up process through electronic medical records were enrolled in this retrospective cohort study to determine the potential incidence and types of malignancy that may occur after kidney transplantation and the associated impact on patients and graft survival.Results: Among 748 patients, 63 cases of malignancy appeared in 54 patients (7.2%). Gastrointestinal cancer (12 cases, 19%) and post-transplant lymphoproliferative disorder (12 cases, 19%) were the two most common types of malignancy. The second most common type of malignancy was urinary tract malignancy in 10 patients. Two different types of malignancy were diagnosed in nine patients during our follow-up. The overall graft survival in malignancy patients was better, which may mean that malignancy did not affect the overall graft loss.Conclusions: Clinicians should be aware of the incidence of malignancy in transplant patients and perform routine examinations for early detection of malignancy.

Cancer risk after renal transplantation in South Korea: a nationwide population-based study

“…Kim et al also confirmed a 4.2% rate of malignancy after RT among 757 patients [ 21 ]. In a study by Choi et al, malignancies after RT were found in 7.2% of patients [ 13 ]. Moreover, another study based on the Taiwanese population found 320 cases (6.8%) of posttransplant malignancies in 4716 RTRs [ 12 ].…”

“…In South Korea, a single-center study reported malignant lymphoma and stomach cancer as the two most common types of malignancies [ 13 ]. However, the sample size of that study was insufficient to represent the nationwide incidence of malignancies after RT.…”

Synchronous skin squamous cell carcinoma and papillary thyroid carcinoma after renal transplantation: a case report

“…Despite the developing malignancy does not aff ect graft survival, the reduction of malignancy risk among transplant patients is very important since they experience worse outcomes with increased cancer-related mortality. Th is may be achieved by using immunosuppressive drugs with antitumor eff ects or adopting low-level immunosuppression as well as regular cancer screening of the transplanted patients [1,9,15]. Specifi c cancer prevention, screening and treatment programs for people with solid organ transplantation are highly recommended [4,13].…”

“…Acquired immune defi ciency caused by immunosuppressive drugs is supposed of being the cause of such high incidence. Th e most common malignancy in those patients is non-melanocytic skin cancer, while thyroid cancer is not very common and does not show a higher incidence than in general population [1][2][3][4].…”