Louise Gagnon

June 5, 2008 (Toronto) — Data presented here at the American Transplant Congress suggest that renal function is preserved in patients who are on a regimen of mycophenolate mofetil (MMF) with sirolimus (SRL) after kidney transplantation.

In an effort to explore the effect of avoiding the use of calcineurin inhibitors post-transplantation, investigators of the Spare-the-Nephron trial compared the efficacy and tolerability of 2 immunosuppressive regimens in an open-label, prospective multicenter design. One regimen consisted of MMF and SLR, and the other regimen consisted of a calcineurin inhibitor (CNI), either cyclosporine or tacrolimus (TAC), with MMF.

All participants were first treated with a combination therapy consisting of MMF and CNIs. Each of the 32 participating study sites in the trial put in place their own practice of antibody induction and/or administration of steroids.

Patients were not included in the trial if they had more than 1 biopsy-proven acute rejection at study entry, had total cholesterol levels of 300 mg/dL, or had greater or total triglyceride levels of 350 mg/dL or more. Patients who had serum creatinine (SCr) of 2.5 mg/dL or creatinine clearance (CrCl) of 30 mL/minute or less at study entry were also excluded.

Please click here to read the whole Medscape Story