Background: As marijuana (MJ) legalization is ongoing, kidney transplant programs need to develop listing criteria for MJ users. No data exist on whether recreational MJ use influences patient or graft survival, or graft function. We hypothesize that such MJ use is not associated with worse outcomes.

Methods: This is a single center retrospective chart review of 1225 transplants from 2008-2013. MJ use was defined as a positive urine toxicology screen and/or patients who admitted to recent MJ use. The primary outcome was death at 1 year or graft failure (defined as GFR<20ml/min by MDRD), which was adjusted for living donor status and EPTS. These were compared between patients with or without marijuana use using logistic regression analyses. The secondary outcome was graft function (creatinine and MDRD GFR) at 1 year.

Results: MJ use was not associated with worse primary outcomes by unadjusted (p=0.87) or adjusted (p=0.79) logistic regression analysis. Among grafts that functioned at 1 year, the mean creatinine (1.52, 95%CI 1.39-1.69 vs 1.46, 95%CI 1.42-1.49; p=0.38) and MDRD GFR (50.7, 95%CI 45.6-56.5 vs 49.5, 95%CI 48.3-50.7; p=0.65) were similar between MJ users and non-users. MJ users were younger than non-users (45.8 vs 53.1 years, p<0.0001), and more likely to report alcohol (65.5% vs 43.4%; p=0.003) or tobacco (78.6% vs 41.3%; p<0.0001) use. MJ users were less likely married or partnered (40.7% vs 68.7%; p<0.0001), and less educated than non-users (17.3% of MJ users and 9.1% of non users had not obtained a high school diploma or GED (p=0.084); MJ users were also less likely to hold a college or graduate degree (11.5% vs 32.3%; p=0.003)). Race was not associated with MJ use. Tobacco use (p=0.594), alcohol use (p=0.403), education (p=0.9) and marital status (p=0.24) were not associated with 1-year outcome.

Conclusion: Isolated recreational MJ use is not associated with poorer patient or kidney allograft survival at 1 year. MJ users enjoy similar graft function to non-users at 1 year and recreational MJ use should not be considered a contraindication to kidney transplantation.

« Back to 2015 American Transplant Congress