Transplants may be boosted by machine that changes kidney blood type

In a discovery that could upsurge the supply of kidney transplants, researchers have effectively changed the blood type of the donor’s kidneys.

The advance has specific advantages for minority groups, who often find it harder to find a match.

A kidney from someone with blood type B cannot be given to someone with type A; therefore, in changing the blood type of a kidney to the universal type O, the kidney can be transplanted to any patient.

Those from black and other ethnic minority groups are more likely to have the rarer B blood type, so they often have to wait a year longer for a transplant than white patients.

In addition, rates of organ donation among those populations are significantly lower. Just over nine per cent of total organ donations in 2020 came from minority ethnic donors despite people from those communities making up thirty-three per cent of the waiting list for a kidney transplant.

Scientists from the University of Cambridge used a device that helps preserve a kidney by passing oxygenated blood through it, called a normothermic perfusion machine, to flush blood infused with an enzyme through a kidney.

The machine effectively changes the organ blood type to type O by removing the blood-type markers that line the kidney’s blood vessels. When successfully demonstrated on three donor kidneys, the process took only hours.

A PhD student who worked on the study, Serena MacMillan, has stated it was “very exciting to think about how this could potentially impact so many lives”.

Observing how the kidneys respond when given a regular supply of blood from their new blood group would be the next step. This can be tested before the organ is transplanted into a patient using a machine.