Primary Outcome Measures:
- Incidence of bronchiolitis obliterans syndrome [ Time Frame: 1 year ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
Secondary Outcome Measures:
- Incidence of acute rejection [ Time Frame: 1 year ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
- Incidence of hospitalisation [ Time Frame: 1 year ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
- Incidence of graft loss (death or re-do-transplantation) [ Time Frame: 2 year ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
Biospecimen Description:
Nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal swabs
bronchoalveolar lavage
blood samples
Informed consent was obtained from the LTx recipients and the study was approved of by the institutional review board of Hannover medical school.
LTx recipients are screened for CARV infections during the cold season (end October until end April) in a single-centre outpatient clinic. Symptoms of upper (URTI) and lower respiratory tract infections (URTI) are recorded by questionnaires and findings.
Nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal swabs (NOS) were performed to detect RV-antigens by immunofluorescence testing (IFT) of respiratory-syncytial virus (RSV), adenovirus, parainfluenza (PIV), influenza and cultures for CARV are performed. BAL was performed when clinically indicated and processed by IFT. Multiplex-PCR to detect 14 CARV are processed in symptomatic patients.
In addition blood samples are monitored at each contact on EBV-DNA, CMV early antigen-testing and adenovirus-DNA by PCR.