Quality of Life and Mental Satisfaction Improve Slowly in Preemptive Kidney Transplantation Compared With Nonpreemptive Kidney Transplantation

Background and aims: Preemptive kidney transplantation (PEKT) is recognized as the best therapy to avoid dialysis. However, it is not clear whether PEKT recipients experience an improvement in quality of life (QoL) after kidney transplantation (KT) that exceeds that of non-PEKT recipients, since PEKT recipients have not experienced the heavy burden of dialysis. The aim of this study was to compare the changes in QoL for PEKT and non-PEKT recipients following transplantation.

Methods: Patients included in this study underwent living donor KT in our hospital. We excluded patients with incomplete SF-36 scores and with factors that could affect QoL, such as complications or rejection. QoL was assessed by the Short Form 36-Item Health Survey version 2.0 preoperatively and 3 and 12 months postoperatively.

Results: Eighty-eight patients underwent living donor KT in our hospital. Twelve PEKT and 20 non-PEKT recipients were enrolled in this retrospective study. In the non-PEKT group, both the physical and mental domain scores dramatically improved from baseline at 3 months, and remained at a similar level at 12 months. In contrast, in the PEKT group, only 1 domain of the physical and mental score improved at 3 months, and the social functioning score gradually improved at 12 months. Although the mental component score showed significant improvement in the non-PEKT group, it did not change in the PEKT group.

Conclusions: The improvement of QoL after transplantation is more evident in the non-PEKT group. PEKT recipients have less mental satisfaction than non-PEKT recipients.