HLA molecular epitope mismatching and long-term graft loss in pediatric heart transplant recipients

Background Although evidence links HLA allele mismatching to worse outcomes in pediatric heart transplantation, no studies to our knowledge have applied the quantification of structural HLA differences between donor and recipient to risk evaluation. We examine the association between molecular-level HLA mismatching and long-term graft loss in pediatric recipients of heart transplants. Methods HLA Matchmaker was used to quantify the number of...