Risk factors for early development of cardiac allograft vasculopathy by intravascular ultrasound.

Background: Cardiac allograft vasculopathy (CAV) is the leading cause of late graft loss. While there are numerous post-transplant factors which may increase the risk of the development of CAV, there is a paucity of data on the impact of donor-derived atherosclerosis (DA), early discontinuation of prednisone, and early initiation of proliferation signal inhibitors (PSI) as assessed by intravascular ultrasound (IVUS).

Methods: Retrospective single-center study of all adult transplant patients (2008-2017) with serial IVUS at baseline and annually for 5 years.