Implications of COVID- 19 on organ transplantation in the state of Paraná in the years 2020 and 2021

Abstract

The Pandemic of COVID-19 caused by the coronavírus (SARS-CoV-2) impacted thee world in several ways, including Brasil. With the advent of the pandemic, the Brazilian health system suffered great stress, hospital beds, wards, and ICU's became scarce, elective surgeries stopped taking place due to the risk of patient exposure, and countless doubts about the effects of immunosuppressants on the progression of the disease were raised. Faced with this new reality, organ transplant surgeries have had a significant impact; both donation activities, transplants, and transplanted patients have been affected in various ways. Therefore, the objective of this study is to understand how the pandemic affected the solid organ transplantation rates in the state of Paraná. To this end, data was collected from the Data SUS platform, about the number of organ transplants performed in the state of Paraná and its macro-regions in the period from June 2017 to May 2022. The results achieved showed that there was a significant decrease in this number, and the absolute number of transplants in the state of Paraná in the year 2020 was 19.2% lower, then in the same period in 2019. It was observed that the impact of the Pandemic was through multiple variables and that even a model state like Paraná that is equipped with a consolidated and integrated organ transplant program is susceptible to such impacts.