Kidneys are the most commonly transplanted organ with 30,000 transplanted world-wide each year, but the number of patients waiting for a kidney massively exceeds this, at 120,000 world-wide. It is therefore critical to lengthen the lifespan of the transplanted kidney by reducing the drugs that cause toxicity in the transplanted kidney, which can lead to kidney loss and the need for another transplant.
"The lack of organs and the growing number of patients needing them is of great concern. Therefore, anything we can do to help patients keep their transplanted kidney for longer is beneficial to everyone," comments Dr Helio Tedesco, Chief of Clinical Investigation of the Federal University of So Paulo, Brazil.
"We have known for many years that the continued use of calcineurin inhibitors such as cyclosporine is one of the factors associated with increased kidney toxicity, contributing to progressive kidney failure and, eventually, kidney loss. In this trial, we have seen that when cyclosporine is substituted with CellCept, we were able to reverse some of the cyclosporine-associated toxic effects and halt the progression of the damage to the kidney in the majority of the patients, thereby lengthening the life span of the transplanted kidney," continued Dr Tedesco.
"These are important data. If the one-year findings of this trial represent what we will find in five years' time, patients can hope to experience a profound improvement in their quality of life, thanks to this switch in therapy. CellCept provides patients wit
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Contact: Roana Mahmud
roana.mahmud@ketchum.com
44-20-7611-3592
Ketchum
29-Aug-2002