Surgical complications in 500 kidney transplantations.
The surgical complications in a series of 500 transplantations done by a single transplantation unit with over ten years' experience in the field are reported. The complications are divided into vascular, urological and gastrointestinal. In addition, renal rupture, primary wound infections and operative deaths are reported. Most of the losses of transplants caused by surgical complications are due to renal rupture and vascular complications, accounting for 3.6 and 2 percent of losses respectively out of the 500 kidney transplants. The urological complications caused a loss of the remaining 1.2% of a total of 6.8%. tthe overall mortality was highest in gastrointestinal complications with 6% of the total of 10% deaths following surgical complications. The mortality rate in the group of patients with gastrointestinal bleeding and perforations and with acute pancreatitis was extremely high. More accurate screening for potential candidates for gastroduodenal ulceration and better prophylactic treatment is needed. More active treatment of acute pancreatitis is suggested.