by Tamer A. Addissouky

Received: 25 May 2025;  Published: 09 September 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2503257

Liver and lung transplantation remain among the most intricate and resource-intensive arenas in modern medicine, challenged by organ scarcity, immunological complexities, and the persistent threat of rejection. According to recent WHO and UNOS reports, approximately 100,000 patients globally await liver transplants annually, with only 30-40% receiving transplants, resulting in waitlist mortality rates of 15-20%. Similarly, lung transplant demand exceeds supply by a factor of 4:1, with 5-year survival rates remainin [...]

by Alexis Guenette  and Valentina Stosor

Received: 12 March 2025;  Published: 04 September 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2503256

Provided that cell-mediated immunity (CMI) is known to be vital in managing CMV infection post-transplant along with improving methods to predict the development of cytomegalovirus (CMV) following transplant, CMV-specific-cell-mediated immunoassays have been developed, commercially and research based, to be used in conjunction with pre-transplant CMV serological testing and prophylaxis to help tailor an individual care plan post-transplant. In this review, we assess the status of CMV CMI assays, and their potential [...]

by Tessa M. Andermann  , Ke Zeng  , Sayal Guirales-Medrano  , Adam Groth  , Bhanu C. Ramachandran  , Shan Sun  , Alicia A. Sorgen  , Lauren Hill  , Amy T. Bush  , Hongwei Liu  , Corbin Jones  , Jeffrey Roach  , Brian P. Conlon  , Gauri Rao  , Nelson J. Chao  , Anthony A. Fodor  and Anthony D. Sung

Received: 24 April 2025;  Published: 25 August 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2503255

Home-based hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HCT) is an innovative care model with growing interest, but its impact on the gut microbiome remains unexplored in a randomized setting. We present interim results from the first randomized controlled trials (RCT) evaluating the effect of HCT location—home versus hospital—on gut microbial diversity and antimicrobial resistance (AMR) gene carriage. We hypothesize that patients randomized to undergo home HCT would have higher gut taxonomic diversity and lower AMR ge [...]

by Lara Jones  , David Ross  , Andrew Doud  , Navchetan Kaur  , Sangeeta Bhorade  and Holly Keyt

Received: 31 March 2025;  Published: 21 July 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2503254

The demographics of lung transplant (LT) recipients show an evolution towards increased minority racial/ethnic representation, thanks to an increased focus on inclusion in LT access, healthcare and outcomes. Herein we assess potential differences in LT allograft health in a predominantly Hispanic/Latino (HL) vs Non-Latino/White (NLW) cohort during surveillance for acute rejection by analyzing the fraction of donor-derived cell-free DNA (dd-cfDNA%), a plasma biomarker of allograft injury. Of 245 LT recipients, media [...]

by Filomena Emanuela Laddaga  , Tommasina Perrone  , Pellegrino Musto  , Ilaria Farella  , Stefano Martinotti  and Francesco Gaudio

Received: 22 February 2025;  Published: 18 June 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2502253

Primary mediastinal large B-cell lymphoma (PMLBCL) is an aggressive B-cell malignancy that may exhibit resistance to standard chemoimmunotherapy. Novel immunotherapeutic strategies, including checkpoint inhibitors and chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) therapy, are being explored in cases that are refractory to treatment. We report the case of a 29-year-old patient with refractory PMLBCL who was treated with pembrolizumab as a bridging therapy followed by axicabtagene ciloleucel (CAR-T) after failing R-CHOP a [...]

by Manish Suryapalam  , Jay Kanaparthi  , Shineui Kim  , Pedram Shafiei-Jahani  , Armeen Barghi  and Mohammed Kashem

Received: 10 November 2024;  Published: 11 June 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2502252

While heart transplantation is increasingly performed in the United States for elderly patients, survival outcomes have primarily been analyzed in single-center studies. The few existing long-term studies have indicated no difference in HTx outcomes between patients ≥70 years and 60-69 years age, but these studies only assessed to 5-years post-transplant and included data from the 1980-90s, introducing significant variance due to poorer outcomes in that era. We analyzed the UNOS database from 1987-2020, stratified [...]

by Elham Amjad  and Babak Sokouti

Received: 21 February 2025;  Published: 09 June 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2502251

Graft rejection, early allograft dysfunction (EAD), and poor diagnostic accuracy are some of the challenges that still need to be addressed, even though liver transplantation (LT) has the potential to help patients with end-stage liver disease (ESLD) significantly. Traditional procedures, such as liver biopsies and liver function tests (LFTs), often fail to identify abnormalities early and with accuracy. Genomic RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq) has recently emerged as a powerful approach for identifying molecular markers o [...]

by Filomena Emanuela Laddaga  , Bruna Daraia  , Pamela Pinto  , Antonio D’amato  , Stella D’oronzo  , Stefano Martinotti  and Francesco Gaudio

Received: 23 January 2025;  Published: 06 June 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2502250

Off-the-shelf cellular therapies, utilizing allogeneic T cells derived from healthy donors, represent a promising alternative to autologous chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) therapies for the treatment of hematological malignancies such as leukemias and lymphomas. Unlike autologous approaches, which require the patient’s own cell collection, modification, and expansion, off-the-shelf therapies can be prepared in advance, substantially reducing treatment timelines, decreasing costs, and improving global acces [...]

by Moussa Hamidani  , Salah Aberkane  and Moudjahid Aissaoui

Received: 17 December 2024;  Published: 16 May 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2502249

Although immunosuppressive drugs are essential and effective in improving the health status of renal transplant patients, they also make them more vulnerable to the risk of infection with COVID-19, which has become a significant concern for many patients. Perhaps this is what makes their way of thinking and perception impact their adherence to taking immunosuppressants. Therefore, this study reveals the possibility of an impact of illness perception and some sociodemographic and clinical factors on treatment adhere [...]

by Camilo A. Velasquez  , Simon Yaguare  , Sabrina Gambini  , Elizabeth McElhiney  and Suresh Keshavamurthy

Received: 19 September 2024;  Published: 27 April 2025;  doi: 10.21926/obm.transplant.2502248

Lung transplantation (LTx) is the gold standard for the surgical treatment of end-stage lung disease. Ongoing discussions persist whether single lung transplantation (SLT) or bilateral lung transplantation (BLT) lead to better patient outcomes and quality of life. This study analyzed 58 peer-reviewed articles from 1990 to 2024, comparing SLT and BLT across several parameters, including indications for transplantation, overall survival, pulmonary hypertension, complications, chronic rejection, functional status, and [...]