BEIJING, Aug. 9 -- More and more kidney transplants
in Shanghai are being conducted between patients and relatives.
Medical experts say these live transplants are more
effective and have a higher success rate than the traditional method where
organs from corpses are used.
Local hospitals have conducted 60
live kidney transplants from January to June this year - since 1982, 200 such
transplants have been carried out.
"About two-thirds of our kidney transplants are
between patients and relatives so far this year. Last year more than 90 percent
of the kidneys transplanted were from corpses," said Dr Ling Jianyue from Renji
Hospital's organ transplant center, which has conducted five live kidney
transplants this year.
Dr Zhu Tongyu from Zhongshan Hospital said 60 percent
of its kidney transplants this year were live and added that patient education
and the introduction of minimally invasive surgery for the donors have helped
increase live transplants.
"Compared with organs from corpses, people receiving
kidneys from relatives suffer fewer rejection problems and survive longer," he
said. "The 10-year level of survival for a patient who has received a
transplanted kidney from a corpse is 50 percent, while for those who receive
live transplants the level is 70 to 80 percent."
China has the second highest number of organ
transplants in the world, after the United States. There are some 10,000
transplants conducted in the country every year and about half of these
transplants are kidneys.
However, there are 1.5 million Chinese suffering
organ failure and waiting for transplants.
"China has one million patients suffering uremia and
this number is increasing by 12 to 15 percent annually. About half of the
patients are suitable for transplants but the 5,000 transplants carried out
annually is far from meeting the demand," said Tang Xiaoda, director of Shanghai
Organ Transplant Association. "The city has 4,000 new uremia patients every
year. At present, about 8,000 patients depend completely on dialysis. Local
hospitals only do 500 to 600 transplants because of the shortage of organs."
Currently in China, only four percent of kidney
transplants are between patients and relatives, far below the worldwide level of
30 percent. In the United States, half of the organs are donated by relatives
while in Japan more than 90 percent come from relatives.
To encourage live transplants, the Shanghai Roche
Pharmaceuticals and the Ministry of Health launched a project this year
providing live transplant recipients with 8.09 million yuan (US$1.07 million)
worth of anti-rejection medication.
(Source: Shanghai Daily)
