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The Royal Free Hospital has performed its first blood group mismatched kidney transplant, where donor and recipient have a different blood group. Jayne Verity, 39, received the kidney from her sister, Rachel Thompson, 37, in May this year. Rachel’s kidney was a good genetic match for Jayne but they were blood group incompatible – Jayne is blood group B and Rachel is AB. The pair are now talking about their experience to mark National Transplant Week (6-13 July) and to appeal for more people to join the donor register.  To prevent Jayne’s immune system attacking her new kidney, she underwent a two-hour treatment called plasmapheresis which involved circulating her blood through a machine that removed antibodies. Jayne had six treatments before her transplant in May and a few sessions afterwards. She was also put on an extra regime of immune-suppressing drugs to reduce the risk of rejection.
The pioneering transplant was performed by Mr Peter Veitch, renal consultant at the Royal Free. Jayne originally suffered kidney failure aged 11 due to a rare condition called Goodpasture’s disease. She waited five years for a kidney from an unknown donor and the transplant was performed at the Royal Free by renal consultant Dr Paul Sweny. The sisters, who both live in Hayes, Middx, have always been close and when Jayne’s donor kidney started failing in January last year, Rachel offered to be a donor. As well as looking after her children Stephanie, 15, and nine-year-old Stanley, foster mum Jayne continued fostering when she was on dialysis and has fostered 200 children in eight years. After the transplant, Jayne soon recovered her health. "I felt awful on dialysis and it was like getting a new lease of life. The nurses and doctors at the Royal Free were brilliant – I can’t fault them at all – and it all went extremely well." The blood incompatible transplant was the first ever performed at the Royal Free. The first in the UK was carried out about five years ago and only about 20 have been performed since. Dr Mark Harber, renal consultant at the Royal Free, says: "This type of transplant is still very unusual. It’s being done in the United States and a lot of the expertise comes from Japan where for cultural reasons they perform very few cadveric transplants. "Historically, it was a complete no, no as the new kidney would be destroyed by the recipient’s antibodies." After a rigorous trust safety board process, the Royal Free set up a programme to carry out this type of transplant and the hospital hopes to perform two more this year. "This transplant is much more complex than a standard one but fortunately Jayne was a very suitable patient with the right antibody levels. Now blood incompatible transplants, which have only been around a few years, are an increasingly successful treatment and it can be done as long as the patients are selected very carefully." Notes to editors
1) For further information contact: Soraya Madell, communications manager, Royal Free Hampstead NHS Trust, t: 020-7830 2963, soraya.madell@royalfree.nhs.uk 3) Pic caption: Jayne Verity, left, and her sister Rachel Thompson 2) The Royal Free Hampstead NHS Trust has around 900 beds and sees about 700,000 patients a year from all over the world. We employ around 4,600 people and have a turnover of about £450m. Our services include a major accident and emergency service, all branches of surgery and medicine, a renal service serving the whole of north London, paediatrics, maternity services, care of elderly people, an adolescent psychiatric service and one of two high security infectious diseases units in the country. We are renowned for our specialist services including liver, kidney and bone marrow transplantation, renal, AIDS/HIV, infectious diseases, plastic surgery, immunology, paediatric gastroenterology, ENT surgery and audiological medicine, amyloidosis and scleroderma. We are a leading cancer centre with a range of specialist diagnostic and treatment services in oncology and haematology and a major neuroscience base with a network extending throughout north London and into the Home Counties. There are associated internationally recognised research and training programmes.
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