Pancreatic islet isolation from donation after circulatory death pancreas

Abstract In many countries, there are an insufficient number of organs retrieved from donation after brain death (DBD) procedures in order to keep time on deceased donor organ waiting lists acceptable. Organs from donation after circulatory death (DCD) procedures could help to relieve this pressure. In some countries, DCD pancreas is increasingly used for both vascularized pancreas and islet transplantation. With more stringent donor pancreas acceptance criteria, preliminary results indicate that islet isolation from DCD pancreas results in a somewhat reduced number of isolated islets, but no consistent difference in functionality in vitro or clinical outcome in islet transplant recipients. Although more data on clinical outcome are clearly needed, islets from DCD donors can be considered for clinical islet transplantation.