“Cocaine Use in Heart Transplant Donors: A Call to Expand the Donor Pool”

The number of patients surviving to stage D heart failure has been increasing, while the supply of donor hearts has remained relatively stable.1-2 Importantly, cardiac allografts from extended-criteria donors, such as those with history of cocaine use, are frequently discarded due to concern over organ quality. Cocaine use particularly raises concerns for cardiac complications including risk of myocardial ischemia, coronary artery vasospasm, myocarditis, and arrhythmias.3 Prior data however, suggests that use of donors with cocaine use does not result in worse outcomes after heart transplantation, though longer-term data regarding complications of cardiac allograft vasculopathy and allograft rejection are limited.

Source: The Journal of Heart and Lung Transplantation - September 22, 2020 Category: Transplant Surgery Authors: Donya Mohebali, Jon A. Kobashigawa Tags: Editorial Source Type: research