Cardiovascular Risk Factors after Renal Transplantation: Importance of Immunosuppressive Therapy

Cardiovascular morbidity and mortality of renal transplant patients highly determine the long-term prognosis. Post-transplant detection and early treatment of cardiovascular disease is mandatory. The most relevant risk factors are hypertension, pre-transplant vascular disease, graft dysfunction, diabetes, hyperlipidemia and smoking. Furthermore, the immunosuppressive therapy is most relevant because it majorly affects risk factors. It should be targeted to rejec-tion avoidance, graft function and cardiovascular disease, which all might change over the years. Recent studies have established newer risk factors such as anemia or proteinuria, which can be properly treated by well-known drugs.