Platelet activation following withdrawal of life support in donation after circulatory death donors

Donation after circulatory death (DCD) heart transplantation is gaining widespread acceptance as an additional pathway for donor heart procurement, with excellent short- and mid-term results reported by high-volume centres in Australia and the UK [1, 2]. Due to the obligatory warm ischemic time (WIT) to which all DCD allografts are exposed, the establishment of the first successful adult DCD with distant procurement program in 2014 was dependent on both the development of pharmacological conditioning agents to mitigate myocardial injury, as well as an ex-situ perfusion system to minimise ongoing ischemia and provide a platform for assessing the viability of the donor heart [3].
Source: The Journal of Heart and Lung Transplantation - Category: Transplant Surgery Authors: Tags: Research Correspondence Source Type: research