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Donated kidneys from deceased COVID-19 patients are safe to transplant

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Study finds that such organs don’t transmit virus that causes COVID-19

By Jim Dryden

Kidneys from organ donors who were diagnosed with COVID-19 are safe to transplant and don’t transmit the virus to people who receive those organs, according to a new study led by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

Of the many thousands of kidneys transplanted since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been no reported infections after transplant surgery related to kidneys donated by people who died and had tested positive for the virus. Most donors died of causes other than COVID-19, but even in those who had tested positive for the virus within a week of their deaths, there was no effect on the success of the transplants. Read more from the Washington School of Medicine in St. Louis.

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Kidney transplants from COVID-positive donors are safe: Study

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By Ashleigh Hollowell

Kidney transplant recipients did not have worsened outcomes after receiving an organ from a COVID-19 positive donor, a study published May 30 in JAMA has found. 

Researchers studied outcomes from 45,912 patients who received kidneys from 35,851 deceased coronavirus-positive donors between March 1, 2020, and March 30, 2023. Read more in Becker’s Hospital Review.



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Kidneys From COVID-19-Positive Donors Safe for Transplant

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By Nancy A. Melville
Patients receiving kidneys transplanted from donors with either resolved or active COVID-19 show no greater risk of poor outcomes or death, shows new research, which also indicates that the reluctance to use those kidneys early in the pandemic appears to be waning.

“This cohort study found that the likelihood of nonuse of COVID-19–positive donor kidneys decreased over time and, for kidneys procured in 2023, donor COVID-19 positivity was no longer associated with higher odds of nonuse,” write the authors in their study, published today in JAMA Network Open.
Read more in Medscape.

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Myocarditis, pericarditis incidence low across 10 million doses of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines

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By Caitlyn Stulpin
The incidence of myocarditis/pericarditis among veterans was low across more than 10 million doses of messenger RNA COVID-19 vaccines, given as a primary or booster dose, administered at the Veterans Health Administration, researchers found.

“We conducted this study because we were interested in estimating the incidence rate of myocarditis, pericarditis and myopericarditis following a COVID-19 mRNA vaccine across the Veterans Health Administration (VHA),” Jing Luo, MD, MPH, assistant professor of medicine at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, told Healio. Read more in Healio.

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Heart donors with COVID-19 found to confer higher mortality risk to those receiving new hearts

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By Bob Yirka
A team of medical researchers from Montefiore Medical Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York has found that mortality rates are higher for transplant patients receiving a new heart from a person infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus than from those not infected. In their study, reported in Journal of the American College of Cardiology, the group analyzed data in the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) database related to COVID-19. Read more in Medical Xpress.

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Prior COVID-19 infection increases risk for incident diabetes by 17%

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By Michael Monostra

Adults who previously tested positive for COVID-19 have a higher risk for developing diabetes than those who did not test positive, according to findings published in JAMA Network Open.

“The study highlights the importance of medical professionals being mindful of the possible long-term consequences of COVID-19,” Naveed Zafar Janjua, MBBS, MSc, DrPH, executive director of data and analytic services at British Columbia Center for Disease Control, Provincial Health Services Authority; and clinical professor in the school of population and public health at University of British Columbia, told Healio. Read more in Healio.

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Unpacking the emotional layers of transplant: guilt, gratitude, and grief

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The most complicated relationship you’ll have with a person you’ll never meet

By Christie Patient
This week, while my husband, Jonny, and I sat at home in isolation after our tests for COVID-19 were positive, I struggled to feel joy. My friend sent me a video of someone singing a popular emo anthem while holding a wet strawberry — its soggy leaves pasted to its bright red skin in a way that resembled the hairstyles of many of my millennial peers circa 2004. I have never related more to a piece of fruit.

The angst expressed in emo music — an emotional genre that came after hardcore punk and was the soundtrack for my pubescent years — still lives within me. And there’s nothing like being stuck at home with an infectious disease to bring angst to the surface. Read the full story in Pulmonary Fibrosis News.


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‘We have our work cut out for us’: Raising awareness of pediatric long COVID

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By Rose Weldon
The medical world has to overcome the perception that children are not susceptible to long COVID, physicians said during a U.S. News and World Report webinar on the topic.

Approximately one in eight patients with COVID-19 experiences long COVID, according to data published last year. Among pediatric patients, adolescents are overrepresented.
Read more from Healio News.

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Lung abnormalities persist in some patients 2 years after COVID-19 infection

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By Isabella Hornick
Thirty-nine percent of patients who suffered a COVID-19 infection had interstitial lung abnormalities 2 years following the illness, according to study results published in Radiology.

“At 2-year follow-up, interstitial lung abnormalities (ILAs) or fibrotic ILAs were associated with persistent respiratory symptoms and decreased diffusion function,” Xiaoyu Han, MD, PhD, of the department of radiology at Union Hospital of Tongji Medical College, and colleagues wrote. Read more in Healio.

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Mortality From COVID-19 Infection in Kidney Transplant Recipients Over Time

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Yorg Al Azzi, MD, and colleagues at Montefiore Medical Center, Bronx, New York, conducted an analysis to examine the variation in mortality from SARS-CoV-2 infection in kidney transplant recipients during the course of the pandemic. Results were reported during a poster session at the American Society of Nephrology Kidney Week 2022 in a poster titled Decreased Mortality From SARS-CoV-2 in Kidney Transplant Recipients Over the Course of the Pandemic. Read more in Nephrology Times.

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