Kidney Drug Helps Survival Rate In Transplant Recipients

Researchers at Emory University and the University of California San Francisco discovered that the drug belatacept, also sold as Nulojix, works better in organ survival of kidney transplant recipients.

The drug was first approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2011. Health officials note that it works better in preserving kidney function over long term periods and is more effective in suppressing antibodies against the transplanted organs than standard calcineurin inhibitor drugs.

"Belatacept is potentially a transformational drug in kidney transplantation because unlike the currently used calcineurin inhibitor drugs cyclosporine and tacrolimus, it is not toxic to the kidney," said Dr. Flavio Vincenti, a health kidney and pancreas transplant specialist at the University of California San Francisco, in a news release, adding that researchers "are still learning how best to use belatacept in immunosuppression regimens to balance its long-term benefits with greater safety and efficacy in the short term."

For the study, researchers recruited over 600 transplant recipients and assigned them to one of three post-operative treatment groups, including the following, courtesy of the release: a less intensive belatacept regimen, a more intensive belacept regimen and a standard-care cyclosporine regimen. Then, the patients were followed for seven years of treatment following transplantation. 

Among patients treated with either belatacept regimen, the risk of death or organ rejection went down by 43 percent, as compared with patients taking cyclosporine. The risk of death or loss of the transplant after seven years for patients treated with belatacept was 12.7 percent, compared to 21.7 percent for patients treated with cyclosporine.

The study is published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

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