Organ Transplantation: Procedures, Precautions, Consequences, and Alternatives

This paper discusses the procedures of organ transplantations, the special precautions of the transplantation, the consequences of the transplantations, and safer alternatives. It also highlights the barriers that hinder the optimal progression of the transplantations.

Running head: TRANSPLANTATION
Transplantation
Name of the student:
Name of the university
Author note:

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Introduction:
With the growing prevalence of the disease and associated failures, transplantations have
progressed with improvements of the survival methods in the medical field and gradually
become a critical pathway in managing the death around the globe (Cid et al ; p: 301). It has
become essential treatment modality in saving lives of individuals with severe clinical
conditions. The procedure of transplantation involves the removal of the organ, tissue or cells
from the deceased body and transfers it to someone who was diagnosed with the disease in
surgical method with following all of the legal requirements (Araki, Daisuke, et al ; p: 329).
Despite progress in the medical field, certain barriers hinder the optimal progression of the
transplantations. This paper will illustrate procedures of organ transplantations, the special
precaution of the transplantation, the consequences of the transplantations and safer alternatives
in the following paragraphs.
Discussion:
The procedure of the transplantations:
Transplantation is one of the most remarkable successes in the history of medicine. Over
the past decades, the number of the patient waiting for transplantation is continued to be greater
than the number of organ donors. Saran et al. (2017), suggested that every year 114000 number
of men women and children are waiting for the transplantation .According to Kirklin et al.
(2015), 95% of the adults in the US support the organ donations but only 54% are actually signed
up for the donation. Despite other barriers, immunology remains the most forbidden barriers of
the organ transplantations, which involve both lymphocytic and humoral mechanisms. The key
role of the immune system is to protect the body from the pathogenic microbes in its atmosphere
(Kotton et al.; p: 930). In organ transplant, the adaptive immunity is defined as one of the

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greatest response that rejects the transplantation tissues because the major target of the immune
response is the molecules expressed by the surface of major histocompatibility complex of donor
cells and in turn, T cell activates the production of the cytokines, chemokines (Huprikar et al.; p:
1168). Consequently, the productions recruit the elements of innate immunity such as NK Cells
or macrophages. According to Hesselink et al. (2014), the possibility of the rejection decreases if
organ transplantation takes place between individuals with identical MHC (HLA). The prime
reason behind it is the immune cells portrayed the organ of the donor as non-self and induce
subsequent immune responses (Huprikar et al.; p: 1168). Therefore, in order to conduct optimal
transplantation process, matching of MHC of two individual is crucial.
Precautions of organ transplantation:
Since it saved thousands of lives in the previously, the precautions can be taken for preventing
the loss of the transplantation. to support the successful transplantations, several clinical
laboratories perform HLA tests which include HLA typing of donor and recipient, screening of
the HLA antibodies of the recipient and detection of antibodies in the recipient that are reactive
with the lymphocytes of a prospective donor (van et al.; p: 2016). History suggested that the
process conducted by serological testing using antiserums in the complement-dependent
cytotoxic assay. In the recent era, DNA based typing methods are used for evaluating the degree
of HLA matching and survival of the patient. To avoid the hyperactive acute rejections, it is
essential to identify the anti-HLA antibodies to the antigen expressed on the blood cells of the
donor (van et al.; p: 2016).
Moreover, immunosuppressant can be given to the patients to prevent the immune response
during the transplantation. Immune suppressant such as cyclosporine, tacrolimus is a class of

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drugs that are used when the body has the tendency to recognize the donor tissue as foreign
organ and induce the immune response (van et al.; p: 2016).
Worst consequences of the transplantation:
Accumulated evidence enlisted a series of consequence that had been observed after
Transplantations. Although immunosuppressant were given to the patient who is undergoing
transplantation, these drugs are powerful and have potential side effects to affect the normal
functionality of the body. The specific side effects may vary patient to patients such as nausea,
headache, high blood pressure, swelling increased appetite and acne and other skin problem
(Huprikar et al.; p: 1168). According to Hesselink et al. (2014), a considerate number of
individuals experienced hair loss, unwanted hair growth. In severe cases, individually
experienced transplant rejection. Rejection often observed within the first six months after
transplantation. The rejection observed due to the proinflammatory signal such as cytokines,
chemokines induced by the T cell response (Kotton et al.; p: 930). Literature also reported the
death as the worst consequence of transplantation rejection (Kotton et al.; p: 930).
Safe alternatives of the transplantation:
Transplantation procedures usually conducted by the physicians when the organ of
patients failed to do the normal functions. Although the transplantation is the successful
procedure in the history of medicines, certain side effects are massive barriers to the successful
surgical method. Hesselink et al. (2014), suggested that researchers focused on some applications
of stem cells to repair damaged organ instead of transplantation. However, this procedure is only
applicable for the heart transplantations, further researches required in this domain (Cid et al ; p:
301). Other study focused on generating new tissues and organ. Because tissues and organs
contain diverse cells in the anatomic array, the involvements of the stem cells are useful.

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Embryonic stem cells can be used as the replacement of organ transplantations (van et al.; p:
2016). However, these procedures abide by ethical concern.
Conclusion:
Thus, it can be concluded that with the growing evidence of chronic disease and organ
transplantations, transplantation procedure gained massive success in the field of medicines.
Despite progress in the medical field, certain barriers hinder the optimal progression of the
transplantations Immune system plays huge barriers for conducting successful transplantation. In
organ transplant, the adaptive immunity is considered as one of the greatest response that rejects
the transplantation tissues. Immunosuppressant are usually administrated to the patient with
organ transplantations. Certain side effects are also observed for the transplantations procedure.
Accumulated evidence showed certain safer alternatives for organ transplantations, which
prevent the failure of transplantation.

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References:
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time to move toward a minimal residual disease–based definition of complete
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Huprikar, S., et al. "Solid organ transplantation from hepatitis B virus–positive donors:
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