Kidney transplantation in a low-resource setting: Nigeria experience

The incidence and prevalence of chronic kidney disease and end-stage renal disease (ESRD) have continued to increase exponentially all over the world in both developed and developing countries. While the majority of patients in developed countries benefit from various modalities of renal replacement therapies, those from developing economies suffer untimely deaths from uremia and cardiovascular disease. Kidney transplantation (KT) leads to improvement in both the quantity and quality of life. Unfortunately, it is not exploited to its full potential in most countries and this is particularly the case in developing economies. Only a very small fraction of the ESRD population in emerging countries ever gets transplanted because of the many constraints. This review focuses on KT in Nigeria between 2000 and 2010 and assessed particular challenges that need be addressed for KT potential to be fully harnessed in such resource-constrained settings. A total of 143 KTs were performed in 5 transplant centers, some of which have only recently opened. One-year graft and patient survival was 83.2% and 90.2%, respectively, while the 5-year graft and patient survival was 58.7% and 73.4%, respectively. Mortality was reported in 38 (27%) of recipients. The complications recorded included acute rejection episodes in 15–30%, chronic allograft nephropathy in 21(14.7%) and malignancies, particularly Kaposi Sarcoma, which was reported in 8 (5.6%) recipients. It was concluded that KT has led to an improved survival but is bedevilled with unaffordability, inaccessibility, a shortage of donor organs and poor legislative support. Enactment of relevant organ transplant legislation, subsidization of renal care, and further development of local capacities would improve KT utilization and thus lead to better outcomes.