Research into the outcomes of people with diabetic foot ulcer following kidney transplantation has found their outcomes are no worse than those who have not undergone a transplant, despite immunosuppressive therapy.
With little data available on DFU in people who have undergone an organ transplant, researchers from Hadassah-Hebrew University Medical Center in Israel and the Department of Military Medicine and “Tzameret”- Israel Defense forces, set out to review the outcomes.
Chronic immunosuppression may be linked with impaired wound healing and a higher risk of amputations.
To test this, the team examined data from people admitted to a diabetic foot unit between 2014 and 2019, comparing transplant patients’ outcomes – major amputations and mortality rates – with non-transplant patients.
During the study period, out of the 537 people who were hospitalised, 18 of them received immunosuppressive therapy due to kidney transplantation.
They found that post-transplant patients tended to be younger, were more likely to have type-1 diabetes and had lower glucose levels upon admission.
The team reported: “Overall, 30% of the patients underwent major amputation, in-patient mortality rate was 9.3%, and 1-year mortality rate was 27.2%. Rates were similar in the post-transplant vs. the non-post-transplant patients (p=0.83, 1.00, 0.59 respectively).”
They concluded: “Post-transplant patients did not incur worse outcomes in spite of immunosuppressive therapy. Limb salvage efforts should be pursued in these patients similar to the overall population.”
