In situ cooling of pancreata from non-heart-beating donors prior to procurement for islet transplantation.
BACKGROUND
The specific aim of this study was to develop an effective technique for pancreas procurement for islet transplantation from a non-heart-beating donor (NHBD).


METHODS
Between January 2004 and November 2004, 11 human pancreata were procured and processed for islet isolation at a cell processing center. After confirmation of brain-death status, a double-balloon catheter was inserted to prevent warm ischemic damage to the donor pancreas by using an in situ regional organ cooling system that was originally developed for kidney procurement.


RESULTS
Warm ischemic time was controlled with the modified in situ regional cooling system at 6.0 +/- 0.9 minutes (mean +/- SE). The operations for procurement of the kidneys and pancreata lasted 48.1 +/- 3.6 minutes and 9.9 +/- 4.8 minutes, respectively. The islet yield per isolation was 396,767 +/- 142,842 IE (islet equivalents). Ten of the 11 cases met the criteria for pancreatic islet transplantation based on the Edmonton protocol.


CONCLUSIONS
We developed a novel procurement technique in cooperation with our kidney procurement team. This protocol for the procurement of pancreas and kidney from an NHBD enabled us to transplant islets into a type 1 diabetic patient and kidney into a renal failure patient.
Nagata
H
H
Department of Transplantation and Immunology, Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine, 54 Kawara-cho Shogoin, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-8507, Japan. hnagata@kuhp.kyoto-u.ac.jp
Matsumoto
S
S
Okitsu
T
T
Iwanaga
Y
Y
Noguchi
H
H
Yonekawa
Y
Y
Tanaka
K
K
D001926:Brain Death; D006323:Heart Arrest; D006801:Humans; D016381:Islets of Langerhans Transplantation; D009392:Nephrectomy / Q000379:methods; D014019:Tissue Donors; D020858:Tissue and Organ Harvesting / Q000379:methods*