Cyclosporin in cadaveric renal transplantation: one-year follow-up of a multicentre trial.

In a multicentre trial conducted in eight European centres, 232 recipients of cadaveric renal allografts were randomly allocated to receive either cyclosporin (117 patients) or azathioprine and steroids (115 patients) for immunosuppression. All patients have now been followed up for at least a year. 1-year graft survival was 72% in the cyclosporin group and 52% in the control group. 24 of the 84 patients in the cyclosporin group with functioning grafts at 1 year had been changed to azathioprine and steroids, and 1 patient had had prednisolone added to cyclosporin therapy; the other 59 patients were receiving cyclosporin as their sole immunosuppressive agent. 16 patients on cyclosporin treatment never received steroids. 1-year patient survival was 94% in the cyclosporin group and 92% in the control group. There was no difference between the two treatment groups in the prevalence of infection. Lymphoma did not develop in any patient. At 1 year post-transplantation, renal function was poorer in patients on cyclosporin than in those on conventional therapy. Thus the 1-year graft-survival rate is higher with cyclosporin alone as a first-line immunosuppressive agent than with azathioprine and steroids.