title: Effects of blood transfusion and cyclosporin on rabbit corneal graft survival.
abstract: Blood transfusion prolongs renal, cardiac, and skin allograft survival, but promotes rejection of bone marrow allografts. At present, it is unclear whether transfusion induces allograft tolerance or sensitization in corneal transplants. We performed eccentric penetrating keratoplasty on New Zealand albino rabbits, using Dutch rabbits as donors. Twenty-four recipient rabbits were randomly allocated into four groups. The control group received no pretreatment. The other three groups received a donor-specific whole-blood transfusion and/or cyclosporin seven days before the corneal transplants. A single blood transfusion accelerated allograft rejection by an average of 8.8 days (p = 0.0005). In contrast, a single cyclosporin pretreatment prolonged graft survival by an average of 5.3 days (p = 0.02). There was no evidence of interaction effects between transfusion and cyclosporin (p = NS). Therefore, unlike renal, cardiac, and skin allografts and similar to bone marrow allografts, prior blood transfusion accelerates corneal allograft rejection in our rabbit model. Although our data can not be extrapolated to human corneal transplants, our results raise the question whether blood transfusion can sensitize humans to corneal allografts.
authors.affiliation: Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, Boston.
authors.forename: E Y
authors.initials: EY
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: M B
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: Raizman
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Rosner
authors.forename: T M
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: Ihley
authors.forename: C S
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Foster
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001803:Blood Transfusion; D003315:Cornea / Q000187:drug effects; D016039:Corneal Transplantation; D003524:Cyclosporins / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D006084:Graft Rejection; D006085:Graft Survival / Q000187:drug effects*; D011292:Premedication; D011379:Prognosis; D011817:Rabbits; D013997:Time Factors
chemical_list: D003524:Cyclosporins