Recommendations for living donor kidney transplantation.

This Guide for Living Donor Kidney Transplantation (LDKT) has been prepared with the sponsorship of the Spanish Society of Nephrology (SEN), the Spanish Transplant Society (SET), and the Spanish National Transplant Organization (ONT). It updates evidence to offer the best chronic renal failure treatment when a potential living donor is available. The core aim of this Guide is to supply clinicians who evaluate living donors and transplant recipients with the best decision-making tools, to optimise their outcomes.

Clinical relevance of anti-HLA donor-specific antibodies detected by Luminex assay in the development of rejection after renal transplantation.

Background: The role of anti-human leukocyte antigen (HLA) donor-specific antibodies (DSA) detected by Luminex in the development of rejection is not fully understood.

Methods: A study including 369 patients who received transplants from deceased donors with a negative complement-dependent cytotoxicity crossmatch (XM) was performed. From the total of patients, 151 underwent a renal biopsy because of renal dysfunction, whereas the 218 remaining showed a stable renal function, and no rejection was assumed.

Clinical relevance of HLA donor-specific antibodies detected by single antigen assay in kidney transplantation.

Background: Clinical relevance of donor-specific antibodies (DSAs) detected by a single antigen Luminex virtual crossmatch in pre-transplant serum samples from patients with a negative cytotoxicity-dependent complement crossmatch is controversial. The aim of this study was to analyse the influence of a pre-transplant positive virtual crossmatch in the outcome of kidney transplantation.

Methods: A total of 892 patients who received a graft from deceased donors after a negative cytotoxicity crossmatch were included.

Diagnostic usefulness of a third-generation anti-cyclic citrulline antibody test in patients with recent-onset polyarthritis.

Background: The high specificity of anti-cyclic citrullinated peptide antibodies (anti-CCP) helps substantially in the diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis (RA), combined with classical markers such as rheumatoid factor (RF). The recent introduction of third-generation methods (anti-CCP3) for anti-CCP detection could further improve diagnostic efficiency. The aim of this study was to determinate the diagnostic efficiency (sensitivity and specificity) of anti-CCP using a new anti-CCP3 method and to compare it with the previous second-generation method (anti-CCP2).

HLA-C and KIR genes in hepatitis C virus infection.

Natural killer (NK) cells are key components of the innate antiviral immune response. NK cell function is regulated by the interaction of major histocompatibility complex class I molecules with NK inhibitory receptors. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of the HLA-C/KIR pair in hepatitis C virus clearance in our population.