Pancreas Transplant Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Pancreas Transplant, including details on risks, prognosis, procedure, surgery, organ donation.

Current practices of donor pancreas allocation in the UK: future implications for pancreas and islet transplantation.

Ridgway DM, White SA, Kimber RM, Nicholson ML

Division of Transplantation, University of Leicester, Leicester General Hospital, Gwendolen Road, Leicester, UK. dan.ridgway1@btinternet.com

Recent refinements in technique mean islet cell transplantation offers the chance of a cure to an increasing patient cohort with diabetes. Such developments put pressure upon the scarce resource of donor organs, with potential competition between the modalities of cellular and solid organ transplantation. This questionnaire based study examines current patterns of donor pancreas procurement and use. Reasons for non procurement are studied together with the attitudes of transplant professionals to pancreas allocation. The minority of potentially useful pancreata are currently made available to either whole pancreas or islet transplant programs. Whilst professionals appreciate the role of each modality, there is a need to define criteria for pancreas allocation to avoid under use of donor organs.

Published 13 June 2005 in Transpl Int, 18(7): 828-34.
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