Science / Medicine : Promise Seen in Drug to Prevent Organ Rejection

An experimental drug holds promise in preventing organ rejection in kidney and liver transplant patients, according to Dr. Thomas E. Starzl of the University of Pittsburgh. The drug has been tested in about 100 patients since early this year. It appears to decrease the frequency of rejection when compared with standard medications. The drug, known as FK 506, is manufactured in Japan.

Starzl’s results have yet to be published in a medical journal or confirmed by other surgeons. “It is a little early to tell whether (FK 506) is a significant advance,” said Dr. Nancy Ascher, a liver transplant surgeon at UC San Francisco. Ascher said significant safety concerns had been raised by tests of FK 506 in animals.

Another study published in the New England Journal of Medicine concludes that the widely used anti-rejection drug cyclosporine, which greatly improved the success of kidney transplants, also made these operations cheaper by helping patients recover more quickly.

Hospital bills for patients getting kidney transplants were 24% lower when they received cyclosporine to prevent their bodies from rejecting the foreign tissue, according to research at UC San Francisco.

The research was based on 702 patients who received transplants between 1982 and 1986, the period during which cyclosporine became widely available.

Among patients getting kidneys from cadavers, hospital bills totaled $28,649 for those receiving cyclosporine and $37,895 for those who did not. They were discharged from the hospital in three weeks rather than five.

Transplants for people with kidney failure were already common before the discovery of cyclosporine. But according to this study, the drug improved the chances of a successful transplant from 60% to 80%.