Introduction: Pancreas transplantation was first performed in Chile in 1994 but after that very few cases were done with an average number of cases per year of less than 1. No waiting list was built either. This until 2014 when Clínica Santa María opened a pancreas transplant program aimed at treating patients from the public and private health system in Chile. The aim of this study is to share the growing experience of our pancreas transplantation program. 

Method: Prospective cohort study that includes all pancreas transplants performed from March 2014 to May 2021 at Clínica Santa María. All patients have complete follow up. All recipient and donor demographics , type of transplant, immediate and late surgical complications, patient and graft survivals were analyzed. SPSS 25.0 was used for statistical analysis.

Results: Forty transplants were performed since March 2014, 38 of them were simultaneous pancreas-kidney transplants (SPK) and 2 pancreas transplants alone (PTA). The indication for transplantation was DM1 in 36 patients (90%) and DM2 in 4 patients (10%). Most patients had chronic kidney disease and 85% were on dialysis at the time of transplant. All transplants were performed from deceased donors. Sixty percent of the patients were female and the median age was 35.9± 6.8 years. The mean waiting time for transplantation was 18.5±10.9 months. Twenty percent of the patients required a re-operation, being hemoperitoneum the most common cause, and the 30-day re-admission rate was 32.5%. Delayed graft function (DGF) of the pancreatic graft wasn’t observed. Three patients presented DFG of the kidney, two of them recovered a normal kidney function and the third one lost his kidney graft due to graft thrombosis. Kaplan-Meier patient survival at one, three and five years is 97.3%, 94.5%, 91.4% respectively. Death-censored graft survival for the kidney graft is 95%, 90%, 77.1% at 1, 3 and 5 years respectively. Death-censored graft survival for the pancreas graft is 100% for the entire period.

Discussion: This abstract shares the experience of the largest series of pancreas transplantation in Chile. Our young program has been growing and maturating and has become a real and tangible option for the diabetic patients of our country regardless of health insurance.