IMR Press / FBL / Volume 13 / Issue 8 / DOI: 10.2741/2903

Frontiers in Bioscience-Landmark (FBL) is published by IMR Press from Volume 26 Issue 5 (2021). Previous articles were published by another publisher on a subscription basis, and they are hosted by IMR Press on imrpress.com as a courtesy and upon agreement with Frontiers in Bioscience.

Article
Mechanisms of chronic rejection in cardiothoracic transplantation
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1 Transplantation Biology Research Center, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, 55 Fruit Street, Boston, Massachusetts, 02114, USA
2 Division of Cardiac Surgery, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, 55 Fruit Street, Boston, Massachusetts, 02114, USA
3 Division of Thoracic Surgery, Department of Surgery, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, 55 Fruit Street, Boston, Massachusetts, 02114, USA

*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

 

Front. Biosci. (Landmark Ed) 2008, 13(8), 2980–2988; https://doi.org/10.2741/2903
Published: 1 January 2008
Abstract

Despite significant improvements in early post-transplantation survival rates, long-term patient and graft survival have remained poor, due in large part to the vexing problem of chronic allograft rejection. Attempts to combat this problem with intensification of immunosuppression have led to concomitant increases in the rates of fatal malignancies and infections. In cardiac transplantation, chronic rejection is manifested primarily by a disease entity known as cardiac allograft vasculopathy, an occlusive narrowing of the coronary vessels. In lung transplantation, chronic rejection is typified by obliterative bronchiolitis, an airflow limiting narrowing of the bronchioles. From an immunologic standpoint, chronic rejection is believed to be the end result of repeated immune and non-immune insults to the graft. This review examines the pathophysiology of heart and lung chronic, with emphasis on both immune and non-immune causes.

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