The impact of kidney transplantation on 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure in end-stage renal disease patients

In this study, we prospectively investigated the impact of kidney transplantation (KT) on the status of hypertension, including circadian rhythm in end-stage renal disease (ESRD) patients. We performed 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure (BP) monitoring and office BP measurement in 48 patients before and 1 year after KT. According to the nocturnal reduction in systolic BP (ΔSBP), the patients were divided into dippers, non-dippers, and reverse dippers. After KT, the mean BP value in office BP and 24-hour ambulatory BP monitoring did not change, but the proportion of patients taking anti-hypertensive drugs and the pill number significantly decreased. In contrast, the mean ΔSBP significantly decreased, and the proportion of non-dippers and reverse dippers did not decrease. Decrease in ΔSBP after KT was associated with inferior allograft function during follow-up. Our study suggests that KT improved the overall BP level, but it did not affect abnormal circadian rhythm in ESRD patients. J Am Soc Hypertens 2015;9(6):427-434.