Patient Survival After Kidney Transplantation: Relationship to Pretransplant Cardiac Troponin T Levels

Assessing cardiovascular (CV) risk pretransplant is imprecise. We sought to determine whether cardiac troponin T (cTnT) relates to patient survival posttransplant. The study includes 603 adults, recipients of kidney transplants. In addition to cTnT dobutamine stress echography and coronary angiography were done in 45% and 19% of the candidates respectively. During 28.4 ± 12.9 months 5.6% of patients died or had a major cardiac event. cTnT levels were elevated (>0.01 ng/ml) in 56.2% of patients. Elevated cTnT related to reduced event‐free survival (hazard ratio (HR) = 1.81, CI 1.33–2.45, p < 0.0001) whether those events occurred during the first year or beyond. This relationship was statistically independent of all other variables tested, including older age, reduced left ventricular ejection fraction (EF) and delayed graft function. cTnT levels allowed better definition of risk in patients with other CV risk factors. Thus, event‐free survival was excellent in older individuals, patients with diabetes, low EF and those with preexisting heart disease if their cTnT levels were normal. However, elevated cTnT together with another CV risk factor(s) identified patient with very poor survival posttransplant. Pretransplant cTnT levels are strong and independent predictors of posttransplant survival. These results suggest that cTnT is quite helpful in CV risk stratification of kidney transplant recipients. Among patients with reduced left ventricular ejection fraction, normal troponin levels identified patients with excellent prognosis while elevated levels of the troponin T biomarker identified patients with particularly poor survival.