Interleukin-2 Receptor Antagonist Does Not Decrease Biopsy-Proven Acute Rejection among Adult Chinese Kidney Transplant Recipients

Induction therapy with interleukin-2 receptor antagonist (IL2RA) is widely used for renal transplant recipients and this study aimed to examine the impact of IL2RA among Chinese renal transplant recipients. Two hundred and thirty-eight Chinese renal transplant recipients aged 18-65 years at the Taichung Veterans General Hospital from January 2004 to July 2009 were retrospectively studied to assess the influence of IL2RA on biopsy-proven acute rejection (BPAR) within 1 year. Secondary outcomes included acute rejection rate in the first 3 months, delayed graft function, post-transplant diabetes mellitus, and malignancy. Cox proportional hazard analysis was used for multivariate analysis. Of all the patients, 116 received IL2RA (basiliximab, n = 44; daclizumab, n = 72) and 122 had no induction therapy. The mean follow-up duration was 43.3 months (range, 1-79 months). Overall, 227 (95.4%) patients completed the 12-month follow-up period with a functioning graft. No difference of BPAR was observed between the two groups and the secondary outcomes were also similar. After adjusting potential covariates with Cox regression, IL2RA use still provided no benefit on BPAR. In conclusion, there is no benefit of IL2RA in decreasing BPAR was observed in our study. Routine use of IL2RA for adult Chinese kidney transplant recipients may not be as effective as we thought before. More research is still needed to elucidate the effect of IL2RA among Chinese kidney transplant recipients.