Transplantation of a heart donated after circulatory death via thoraco-abdominal normothermic regional perfusion and results from the first Spanish case.

BACKGROUND: Controlled donation after circulatory death (cDCD) has emerged as one of the main strategies for increasing the organ donor pool. Because of the ischemic injury that follows the withdrawal of life-sustaining therapies, hearts from cDCD donors have not been considered for transplantation until recently. The ex-situ perfusion of hearts directly procured from cDCD donors has been used to allow the continuous perfusion of the organ and the assessment of myocardial viability prior to transplantation. Based on our experience with abdominal normothermic regional perfusion in cDCD, we designed a protocol to recover and validate hearts from cDCD donors using thoraco-abdominal normothermic regional perfusion without the utilization of an ex-situ device. CASE PRESENTATION: We describe the first case of a cDCD heart transplant performed with this approach in Spain. The donor was a 43-year-old asthmatic female diagnosed with severe hypoxic encephalopathy. She was considered a potential cDCD donor and a suitable candidate for multiorgan procurement including the heart via thoraco-abdominal normothermic regional perfusion. The heart recipient was a 60-year-old male diagnosed with amyloid cardiomyopathy. Cold ischemia time was 55 min. The surgery was uneventful. CONCLUSIONS: This case report, the first of its kind in Spain, supports the feasibility of evaluating and successfully transplanting cDCD hearts without the need for ex-situ perfusion based on the use of thoraco-abdominal normothermic regional perfusion opening the way for multiorgan donation in cDCD.

Implementation of a mobile team to provide normothermic regional perfusion in controlled donation after circulatory death: Pilot study and first results.

Normothermic regional perfusion (NRP) in controlled donation after circulatory death is becoming a popular method due to the favorable results of the grafts procured under this technique. This procedure requires experience, and, sometimes, the availability of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) machines to implement NRP is limited to tertiary hospitals. In order to provide support with NRP in controlled donation after circulatory death across the different hospitals of the Autonomous Community of Madrid, a mobile NRP team was created. In the first 18 months since its creation, the mobile NRP team participated in 33 procurements across nine different hospitals, representing 72% of all controlled donations after circulatory death in the Autonomous Community of Madrid. NRP was successfully performed in 29 (88%) cases, with a mean duration of 69 ± 27 minutes. A total of 39 kidneys, 12 livers, and 5 bilateral lungs were recovered and transplanted. None of the livers were discarded due to an elevation in transaminases during NRP. A mobile NRP team is a feasible option and, in our series, aided in the optimization and recovery of organs from donors after controlled circulatory death in centers where ECMO technology was not available.

Characteristics and outcome of patients with solid tumour requiring admission to the intensive care unit. Usefulness of three severity score systems.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: To describe the characteristics and the evolution of patients with solid tumours admitted to the ICU and to identify factors associated with hospital mortality and to evaluate three illness severity scores. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Descriptive study including 132 patients with solid tumour admitted to the ICU (2010-2016). Demographics and cancer-related data, organ failures, life-supporting therapies and severity scores: APACHE II, SOFA and ICU Cancer Mortality Model (ICMM) were collected. RESULTS: There were 58 patients admitted for medical reasons and 74 for scheduled surgery. The ICU and hospital mortality rate were 12.9% and 19.7%, respectively. The medical reason for admission, the number of organ failures, and the need of life-supporting therapies were significantly associated with a higher mortality (p<0.05). In the logistic regression analysis, the three severity scores: SOFA (OR 1.18, 95% IC 1.14-1.48), APACHE II (OR 1.11, 95% CI 1.09-1.27), and ICMM (OR 1.03, 95% CI 1.02-1.07) were independently associated with a higher mortality (p<0.05). To evaluate the discrimination, the area under the receiver operating characteristics curves (AUROC) were calculated: APACHE II (0.795, 95% CI 0.69-0.9), SOFA (0.77, 95% CI 0.69-0.864) and ICMM (0.794, 95% CI 0.697-0.891). The comparison of AUC ROC after DeLong's test showed no difference between them. CONCLUSION: Hospital mortality was associated with the type and severity of acute illness. The three severity scores were useful to assess outcome and accurate in the discrimination, but we did not find a significant difference between them.