Skin cancer is a major cause of dea...

Skin cancer is a major cause of death among patients who have undergone heart transplants, according to a contemplation in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology. bearinged by researchers at the Skin and Cancer Foundation in Australia, a region with one of the world's highest rates of skin cancer, the subject of attention confirms that the use of immunosuppressants to stop rejection of transplanted organs predisposes patients to skin malignancies. The studious mood analyzed the occurrence of skin cancer in the first 455 patients to suffer transplantation in Sydney, Australia. Researchers build that 31% of the patients lay opened skin cancer after five years, and 43% disentangleed skin cancer after 10 years. Skin cancer also was the cause of 27% of the 41 deaths that occurr after the fourth year.

An article by means of Reuters Health Information about the research reports that previous studies have shown skin cancer rates to be higher among recipients of heart transplants than among other organ transplant patients. Slightly higher doses of immunosuppression agents are prescribed in heart transplantation. Variables in the inquiry significantly associated with skin cancer were caucasian origin, increasing age at transplantation, and duration of follow-up

The researchers approve that heart transplant patients perform regular skin examinations with equal reason that lesions can be exposeed and treated early. They also make acceptable that patients follow their physicians' advice about sunshine protection.

C s Ong et al, "Skin cancer in Australian heart transplant recipients," Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology 40 (January 1999) 27-34; Reuter Health Information, "Skin cancer risk after heart transplant." Available from http://www.heortinfo.org/reutersnews /l012915fhtm Accessed 1 Feb 1999

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