COMMON CAUSES of renal allograft dysfunction include acute rejection, cyclosporine or FK506 toxicity, acute tubular necrosis, and chronic allograft nephropathy. Important but less frequent causes are recurrent and de novo diseases in the allograft. We report the case of a 66-year-old man who developed renal insufficiency 8 months posttransplantation. A novel cause of renal allograft dysfunction...

BACKGROUND There is evidence that biopsy of stable renal allografts may be of value in predicting chronic allograft nephropathy, the main cause of graft loss. However, the reproducibility of such histological evaluation has not been tested in this setting. We tested the reproducibility of the Banff schema for this purpose. METHODS We rated acute and chronic changes in 184 protocol biopsies. I...

Background: Despite the long-standing association of macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF) with delayed-type hypersensitivity response, the potential role of MIF in chronic allograft nephropathy is unknown. The association between upregulation of MIF expression, macrophage and T cell infiltration and the severity of chronic allograft nephropathy suggests that MIF may be an important medi...

Nephropathy from BK virus (BKV) infection is an evolving challenge in kidney transplant recipients. It is the consequence of modern potent immunosuppression aimed at reducing acute rejection and improving allograft survival. Untreated BKV infections lead to kidney allograft dysfunction or loss. Decreased immunosuppression is the principle treatment but predisposes to acute and chronic rejection...

Inflammatory processes and tissue scarring are characteristic features of chronic allograft nephropathy. Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) has beneficial effects on renal fibrosis and it also ameliorates renal interstitial inflammation as it has been recently described. Contrarily to protein administration, intramuscular gene electrotransfer allows sustained release of HGF. So, here we hypothesize...

Progressive loss of renal allograft function after the first year of kidney transplant is often referred to as chronic rejection, transplant nephropathy, transplant glomerulopathy or chronic allograft nephropathy (CAN) and the use of these terms is often interchangeable. Clinically, it is usually diagnosed by a slowly rising serum creatinine level, increasing proteinuria and worsening hypertens...

Chronic renal allograft disease remains a leading cause of graft loss. Immunologic and non-immunologic risk factors are related to its development and may be present before or develop after transplantation. Histological evaluation of renal tissue has an important role in the management, especially for the evaluation of immune activity against the graft and toxicity of immunosuppressive drugs. M...

Despite increasing numbers of patients on dialysis, the numbers of renal transplants performed yearly have remained relatively static. During the last 50 years, there have been many advances in the pharmacology of prevention of organ rejection. However, most patients will suffer from a slow but steady decline in renal function leading to graft loss. The most common cause of long-term graft loss...