Effect of kidney transplantation on cardiac morphology and function

• Published in: Jornal brasileiro de nefrologia : 'orgao oficial de Sociedades Brasileira e Latino-Americana de Nefrologia Vol. 34; no. 1; p. 94
• Main Authors: Souza, Francival Leite de, Monteiro Junior, Francisco das Chagas, Salgado Filho, Natalino
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English; Portuguese
• Published: Brazil 01-03-2012
• Subjects: Echocardiography, Doppler; Heart Diseases - diagnostic imaging; Heart Diseases - etiology; Heart Diseases - pathology; Heart Diseases - physiopathology; Heart Function Tests; Humans; Kidney Transplantation - adverse effects
• ISSN: 2175-8239
• DOI: 10.1590/s0101-28002012000100016

Cardiac involvement is very frequent in patients with chronic kidney disease on dialysis. Kidney transplantation results in reducing morbidity and mortality compared to patients on dialysis. The objective of this review was to address the effect of renal transplantation in cardiac structure and function assessed by echocardiography. Since the 1980s, studies have demonstrated a trend towards improvement in cardiac parameters after kidney transplantation. With the improvement of the Doppler imaging methods, the new studies, although with conflicting results, demonstrated improvement in systolic and diastolic function and reduction of left ventricular mass, especially in the first two years after renal transplantation with stabilization of the parameters in subsequent years. Overall, the body of evidence has demonstrated significant impact of renal transplantation on left ventricular hypertrophy, systolic and diastolic function, but the results are not uniform.