Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 1981 Apr;20(4):435-50.
doi: 10.1007/BF00253405.

Pancreas and islet transplantation. II. Clinical trials

D E Sutherland
Review

Pancreas and islet transplantation. II. Clinical trials

D E Sutherland. Diabetologia. 1981 Apr.

Abstract

Clinical islet allotransplantation has been a safe, but largely unsuccessful enterprise. It has been difficult to apply techniques that might overcome the islet yield and allograft rejection problems encountered in animal experiments. Over the past decade only 4 of 74 attempts at islet transplantation have been followed by long term withdrawal of exogenous insulin therapy, and there are problems with intrepretation of the outcome in each of theses cases, as discussed in the preceding section. In the islet allograft situation, the failures may have been for technical or for immunological reasons. In the autograft situation, rejection could not occur and the failures were clearly technical. The success rate with islet autografts gives some indication as to what might be achieved with islet allotransplantation if rejection could be prevented in the latter situation. The islet autotransplant experience is not entirely predictative, however, for two reasons: 1) the uncertainty over the contribution of the pancreatic remnant to carbohydrate metabolism when less than the total pancreatectomy is done; 2) the increased difficulty with liberating islets from diseased, fibrotic pancreases. For both islet allo- and autotransplantation, the success rate will probably remain low until more effective techniques are developed for preparation of islets from adult pancreases. For the allograft situation, additional advances will be needed in immunosuppression or in techniques to alter islet graft immunogenicity in order to overcome the rejection phenomenon.

PubMed Disclaimer

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Horm Metab Res. 1975 Jul;7(4):314-22 - PubMed
    1. Diabetes. 1980;29 Suppl 1:64-9 - PubMed
    1. Transplant Proc. 1980 Dec;12(4 Suppl 2):58-61 - PubMed
    1. World J Surg. 1977 Jan;1(1):69-75 - PubMed
    1. Transplant Proc. 1980 Dec;12(4 Suppl 2):218-22 - PubMed
-