Pregnancy in renal transplant recipients

Most women of childbearing age who receive a renal transplant have a return of normal menses and have the ability to become pregnant. Most studies indicate that pregnancy does not adversely affect the transplant kidney's survival as long as renal function is good and serum creatinine is stable before pregnancy. The experience with immunosuppressive drugs has been surprisingly reassuring with no increase in congenital anomalies with cyclosporine, prednisone, and azathioprine. There is little experience with newer drugs. Pregnant transplant recipients need to be monitored for opportunistic infections, which may adversely affect the fetus, including herpes, toxoplasmosis, and CMV. Hypertension, urinary tract infections, and anemia are other common problems in pregnant transplant recipients. Despite a high frequency of premature births, over 80% of pregnancies result in surviving infants. (C) 2003 by the National Kidney Foundation, Inc.