Kidney transplant survival rates in kids on rise: report

Though kidney failure once meant a death sentence for young patients, the quality and quantity of transplants has greatly boosted survival rates, according to a new study.

The study, Treatment of End-Stage Organ Failure in Canada, 1996-2005, was conducted by the Canadian Institute for Health Information. It revealsthat although the number of young people with the disease has remained stable, the five-year survival rate for young transplant patients was 96 per cent in 2005.

It also finds that over the past 25 years, the number of kidneys that young Canadians receive from live donors has increased by four times, with 90 per cent now coming from a parent or a sibling.

Between 1981 and 2000, 77.9 per cent of live donors for all age groups, frombirth to 18 years of age, were parents.

The second-largest living donor group inchildren aged 15 to 18 were siblings, accounting for 18.7 per cent of kidney transplants.

Between 1996 and 2005, therewere 733 pediatric kidney transplant procedures, according to the report. Over the last decade, there has been a decrease in the number of deceased donor transplants and an increase in the number of living donor transplants, compared to the periodof 1981 to1995.

Most were between 15 and 19 years old at the time of the transplant, while the smallest number of recipients was in the birth to four years of age group.

The highest proportion of patients was in Nova Scotia (13.8 per cent) for patients between birth andfour years, with Ontario a close second at 13.3 per cent for this age group.

For those pediatric patients agedfive to nine years (28 per cent) and 10 to 14 years (35.5 per cent), the largest population was found in Manitoba.

In the kids who received a living-donor transplant, the survival rate has improved most notably in the birth to four years group, from 83.3 per cent in 1981 to to 96.8 per cent in 2000.