Abstract
Transplantation of lungs from donors with active hepatitis C viremia with early initiation of antiviral therapy has been shown to have similar short- and medium-term outcomes compared to transplantation of lungs from nonviremic donors. Consideration of hepatitis C viremic lungs is particularly helpful in patients with anticipated prolonged time on the waiting list. Whether clinical outcomes remain favorable with delay of initiation of antiviral therapy to the outpatient setting or in patients with higher severity of illness is not well understood. Our transplant center considered hepatitis C nucleic acid testing positive (NAT+) donors for all waitlisted lung transplant candidates without chronic liver disease. For those transplanted with hepatitis C NAT+ lungs, we initiated antiviral therapy in the outpatient setting and continued treatment for 12 weeks. In a retrospective single-center study of 15 lung transplant recipients receiving hepatitis C NAT+ lungs and 88 recipients receiving nonviremic lungs, we tested the hypothesis that deferral of antiviral therapy after transplantation of lungs from hepatitis C NAT+ donors to the outpatient setting would result in similar 1-year survival compared to transplantation of lungs from nonviremic donors. Patients receiving hepatitis C NAT+ lungs had similar baseline characteristics but had longer index hospital lengths of stay (24 vs 13 days, p = 0.021). Patients receiving hepatitis C NAT+ lungs had fewer episodes of acute cellular rejection in the first year. Patients receiving hepatitis C NAT+ lungs had similar 1-year survival to patients receiving lungs from nonviremic donors, after controlling for age and lung allocation score (p = 0.638). In this small single-center study, outpatient initiation of antiviral therapy for donor-derived hepatitis C is associated with acceptable clinical outcomes and can be considered in patients with high severity of illness.