Unrecognized Pretransplant and Donor-Derived Cryptococcal Disease in Organ Transplant Recipients

• Published in: Clinical infectious diseases 2010-11, Vol.51 (9), p.1062-1069
• Main Authors: Sun, Hsin-Yun, Alexander, Barbara D., Lortholary, Olivier, Dromer, Francoise, Forrest, Graeme N., Marshall Lyon, G., Somani, Jyoti, Gupta, Krishan L., Busto, Ramon del, Pruett, Timothy L., Sifri, Costi D., Limaye, Ajit P., John, George T., Klintmalm, Goran B., Pursell, Kenneth, Stosor, Valentina, Morris, Michele I., Dowdy, Lorraine A., Munoz, Patricia, Kalil, Andre C., Garcia-Diaz, Julia, Orloff, Susan L., House, Andrew A., Houston, Sally H., Wray, Dannah, Huprikar, Shirish, Johnson, Leonard B., Humar, Atul, Razonable, Raymund R., Fisher, Robert A., Husain, Shahid, Wagener, Marilyn M., Singh, Nina
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Aged; ARTICLES AND COMMENTARIES; Biological and medical sciences; Central nervous system diseases; Cohort Studies; Cryptococcosis; Cryptococcosis - diagnosis; Cryptococcosis - epidemiology; Cryptococcosis - microbiology; Cryptococcosis - transmission; Cryptococcus - isolation & purification; Female; Fungal infections; Fungemia; Human mycoses; Humans; Infections; Infectious diseases; Liver; Lung diseases; Lungs; Male; Medical sciences; Middle Aged; Miscellaneous mycoses; Mycoses; Nervous system diseases; Postoperative Complications - diagnosis; Postoperative Complications - epidemiology; Postoperative Complications - microbiology; Time Factors; Tissue Donors; Transplantation; Transplants - adverse effects
• ISSN: 1058-4838; 1537-6591
• DOI: 10.1086/656584

Background.Cryptococcosis occurring _30 days after transplantation is an unusual event, and its characteristics are not known. Methods.Patients included 175 solid-organ transplant (SOT) recipients with cryptococcosis in a multicenter cohort. Very early-onset and late-onset cryptococcosis were define as disease occurring _30 days or 130 days after transplantation, respectively. Results.Very early-onset disease developed in 9 (5%) of the 175 patients at a mean of 5.7 days after transplantation. Overall, 55.6% (5 of 9) of the patients with very early-onset disease versus 25.9% (43 of 166) of the patients with late-onset disease were liver transplant recipients (Pp.05). Very early cases were more likely to present with disease at unusual locations, including transplanted allograft and surgical fossa/site infections (55.6% vs 7.2%; P! .001). Two very early cases with onset on day 1 after transplantation (in a liver transplant recipient with Cryptococcusisolated from the lung and a heart transplant recipient with fungemia) likely were the result of undetected pretransplant disease. An additional 5 cases involving the allograft or surgical sites were likely the result of donor-acquired infection. Conclusions.A subset of SOT recipients with cryptococcosis present very early after transplantation with disease that appears to occur preferentially in liver transplant recipients and involves unusual sites, such as the transplanted organ or the surgical site. These patients may have unrecognized pretransplant or donor-derived cryptococcosis.