The Seattle Heart Failure Model in Kidney Transplant Recipients

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of mortality following kidney transplantation. Heart failure affects 17–21% of patients with chronic kidney disease and increases along with time receiving dialysis. The Seattle Heart Failure Model (SHFM) is a validated mortality risk model for heart failure patients that incorporates clinical, therapeutic, and laboratory parameters but does not include measures of kidney function. We applied the SHFM to patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) who were being evaluated for kidney transplantation to determine if the model was associated with post-transplant mortality. This retrospective single-center study analyzed survival among 360 adult deceased-donor kidney transplant recipients. Cox regression was used to model post-transplant patient survival. Our findings indicated that a 1.0-point increase in the adapted SHFM score was significantly associated with post-transplant mortality (HR 1.76, 95% CI = 1.10–2.83, p = 0.02), independently of the Kidney Donor Profile Index and Estimated Post-Transplant Survival. Individual covariates of the SHFM were evaluated in univariate analyses, and age, sodium, cholesterol, and lymphocyte count were significantly related to mortality. This study provides preliminary evidence that an adapted SHFM score could be a useful tool in evaluating mortality risk post-transplant in patients with ESRD.