Long‐term outcomes of tonsillectomy for IgA nephropathy patients: A retrospective cohort study, two‐centre analysis with the inverse probability therapy weighting method

Aim The effect of tonsillectomy on IgA nephropathy remains controversial. The aim of this study was to compare the effect of tonsillectomy on the outcome, end stage kidney disease (ESKD) and all-cause death in IgA nephropathy patients who did and did not undergo tonsillectomy. Methods All basic data were retrospectively gathered from patients who had undergone renal biopsies at two Japanese clinical centers. Two hundred and twenty-seven patients were eligible for the study, with a median age of 34 (Interquartile range (IQR): 25 to 43) years and median follow-up of 92 (IQR: 40 to 178) months. The primary endpoint was the composite outcome of the onset of ESKD and all-cause death before ESKD. We performed a Cox proportional hazard regression analysis after adjusting for patient characteristics using the inverse probability therapy weighting (IPTW) method and a Cox analysis using the Matching method. Similarly, we analyzed these outcomes in a mild cohort. Results We were unable to find any significant advantages of tonsillectomy in either analysis (IPTW and matching, HR: 0.40 (0.12-1.36) P = 0.072 and 0.78 (0.13-4.64) P = 0.786). However, in the mild cohort analysis, our data showed that the Tonsillectomy group tended to be less likely to reach the composite outcomes than the Not Tonsillectomy group with statistical significance (hazard ratio (HR), <0.001 [CI <0.001- < 0.001, P = 0.039]). Conclusion In this study, our findings led us to conclude that performing tonsillectomy in an early and timely manner may have predisponency of less poor prognosis.