Hand-Assisted Laparoscopic Donor Nephrectomy in Living Donors with a History of Abdominal Surgery: A Retrospective Cohort Study

BACKGROUND: Hand-assisted laparoscopic donor nephrectomy (HALDN) is frequently performed in living kidney transplantation donors. This study investigated the efficacy and safety of HALDN for living donors with abdominal surgical histories. MATERIAL/METHODS: A total of 573 living kidney donors underwent donor nephrectomies for living donor kidney transplantation between January 2008 and May 2015. Eighteen donors underwent open donor nephrectomy and were excluded from analyses. Left HALDN was performed in 533 donors, including 44 donors with abdominal surgical histories and 489 donors without abdominal surgical histories. Right HALDN was performed in 22 donors, including 11 donors with abdominal surgical histories and 11 donors without abdominal surgical histories. Graft quality including the lengths of arteries, veins and ureters, time to initial urination, recipient complications, and recipient estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) and operation quality including warm ischemic time, blood loss, operation duration, donor complications and donor eGFR, were compared between donors with and without abdominal surgical histories in the left and right HALDN groups. RESULTS: The metrics of graft and operation quality were similar between living kidney donors with and without a history of abdominal surgery who underwent left or right HALDN. CONCLUSIONS: The efficacy and safety of HALDN were not impaired by abdominal surgical histories.