Rituximab Administered for Recurrent Membranous Nephropathy in a Kidney Transplant Recipient Did Not Eliminate Donor-Specific Antibodies

We describe a case of a renaltransplantrecipient with recurrent membranous nephropathy and recent development of donor-specific antibodies but without histological evidence of active antibody-mediated rejection. The patient received 3 weekly doses of rituximab for recurrent membranous nephropathy, and complete remission was achieved. One year after, he has preserved an excellentrenal function without proteinuria. However, repeated measurements of donor-specific antibodies revealed that rituximab only modestly reduced donor-specific antibodies. Donor-specific antibody levels remained considerably higher than the laboratory reference value. Thus,rituximab alone may not have a role to prevent chronic active antibody- mediated rejection in patients with donor-specific antibodies.PMID:35924746 | DOI:10.6002/ect.2022.0146
Source: Experimental and Clinical Transplantation : official journal of the Middle East Society for Organ Transplantation - Category: Transplant Surgery Authors: Source Type: research