PEDIATRIC HEART TRANSPLANTATION PROGRAM: SINGLE CENTER EXPERIENCE OF 20 YEARS

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: Heart transplantation has been the treatment of choice for children with refractory to conventional therapy. To report the experience with heart transplantation in a single center. MATERIAL AND METHODS: To report the single center experience of hearttransplantation. Data analysis was demographic characteristics, clinical outcome and survival Kaplan Meier curve. RESULTS: From October 30, 1992 to October 2nd, 2012, 120 transplants were performed and 115 patients were submitted to heart transplantation at Heart Institute (InCor) University of Sao Paulo Medical School, Sao Paulo, Brazil. The causes of indication for transplantation were: cardiomyopathies (76%) and congenital heart disease (24%). Five patients were submitted to re-transplantation. Three of them were re-transplanted on the early postoperative period with high mortality (66.6%). One patient was submitted to simultaneous re-transplantation and kidney transplantation after 13.9 yrs of follow-up and one of patient was successful re-transplanted after 10 yr of follow-up. The post-operative immunosuppression regimen was double immunosuppression and polyclonal anti-thymocyte serum induction therapy. The actuarial survival was 80%, 71%, and 61% at 1, 5, and 10 yr, respectively. CONCLUSION: Heart transplantation has been a promising option for children. The use of double immunosuppression with polyclonal anti-thymocyte serum induction therapy combined with surveillance of acute rejection with non-invasive tests may provide favorable clinical outcome.