Renal Transplantation—1972

Excerpt

The major conclusion one must draw from The Ninth Report of the Human Renal Transplant Registry (1) is that since 1966 there has been no significant improvement in patient survival or duration of graft function in renal transplantation. This plateau has occurred despite the use of more sophisticated tissue typing, antilymphocyte globulin, thoracic duct lymphocyte depletion, and a considerable surgical experience. The impressive gains scored before 1966 were clearly due to the introduction of azathioprine and corticoids, the mainstay of present immunosuppressive therapy. Several important factors that affect renal transplant statistics may be influenced by the referring physician, who is