Hospitalization and death after recovery from acute COVID-19 among renal transplant recipients

Introduction Data on post-COVID-19 in renal transplant recipients (RTR) is scarce. We investigated the rate of hospitalizations, reasons for hospital admission, and mortality rate among RTR who survived acute COVID-19. Methods A multi-center retrospective observational cohort study measured hospital admission and death to 180 days after acute SARS-CoV-2 infection in 308 adult patients. Results The median age was 57 years, 64.9% were male. All patients had at least one comorbidity, and 26.3% had diabetes. Data on post-COVID-19 course was available for 267 patients, and 49 of them (15.9%) required hospital treatment after recovery from the acute infection. The most common indications included pneumonia (24.5%) and renal allograft dysfunction (22.4%), 7 (14.3%) had sepsis and 5 (10.2%) had thrombotic events. A median duration of the hospital stay was 12 days. Six patients (2.2%) died due to multiorgan failure, respiratory insufficiency or urosepsis. The strongest predictor for hospitalization after acute COVID-19 was hospitalization for acute SARS-CoV-2 infection, while better allograft function decreased the probability of hospitalization. Conclusion Delayed consequences of acute COVID-19 are highly prevalent and the health care systems should be prepared to respond to the needs of RTR suffering from post-COVID-19 complications.