COMPLICATIONS - CARDIOVASCULAR

H. Pilmore¹, B. Kasiske², A. Israni³, J. Snyder⁴, M. Skeans^5
1Auckland City Hospital, Department of Renal Medicine, Auckland/NEW ZEALAND, ², University of Minnesota, Minneapolis/UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ³Medicine, Hennepin County Medical Center, Minneapolis/UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ⁴Chronic Disease Research Group, Minneapolis Medical Research Foundation, Minneapolis/MN/UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ⁵Chronic Disease Research Group, Minneapolis Medical Research Foundation, Minneapolis/UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Body: Introduction: Cardiovascular Disease remains the most common cause of mortality and morbidity after renal transplantation. Despite the high rates of cardiovascular events in renal transplant recipients, there are few studies examining the effects of cardiovascular medications. PORT is the largest multi-center, international collection of non-immunosuppressive medication data in existence in the renal transplant population. The goal of this study was to describe the use of cardiovascular medications during the first 5 years post-transplant. Methods: The study population included all adult kidney transplant recipients with graft function 30 days post-transplant from a subset of the 14 participating transplant centers. 10 of 14 centers provided data on use of cardiovascular medications (N=14 236). Medication use was defined as using the medication at any time during each 30-day period post-transplant. Results: Beta-blockers and calcium channel blockers were the most commonly used antihypertensive medications, with use in approximately 40% of the population during the first 5 years. Statin use increased from 17% during the first 30 days to 39.6% at 5 years. The use of ACEIs/ARBs also increased to 36.3% at 3 years post-transplant after an initial drop from 15% to 12% during the first 3 months. The use of other cardiovascular medications remained fairly stable. Conclusion: Despite the high cardiovascular risk in the kidney transplant population, the use of medications that have been shown to be beneficial in the general population at high cardiovascular risk remains low.

Disclosure: All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.