Increased Drug Intoxications Seen in Heart Transplant Donors During COVID-19 Pandemic

PURPOSE: The majority of heart transplant centers decline heart donors with known or suspected COVID-19. In addition to impacting donor utilization, we hypothesize that the COVID pandemic is associated with increased number of drug intoxication in heart donors. METHODS: The COVID pandemic was declared on March 11(th), 2020. The Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipient was analyzed during two 15-month eras: era 1 was defined as January 1(st)2019 - March 30(th), 2020 and era 2 was defined as March 31(th), 2020 - June 30th 2021. Donor populations are described by era and UNOS region. T-test was used for trend analysis. RESULTS: Era 1 identified 7,649 donor hearts and era 2 identified 8,475 donor hearts. There was a significant increase of 577 (45.2%) heart donors with drug intoxication identified as the cause of death from era 1 to era 2 (p<0.0001, Figure 1). There was an increase in heart donors from drug intoxication cross all UNOS regions, but the greatest increase was seen in UNOS region 5 (120.3%) followed by region 7 (69.1%) and region 4 (61.4%) (Figure 2). CONCLUSION: More donor hearts were recovered for transplantation during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a notable increase in those who died from drug intoxication. This finding may reflect a psychosocial effect of the pandemic on the general population that has impacted the field of heart transplantation.