Pharmacodynamic parameters of immunosuppressive drugs are not correlated with age, duration of dialysis, percentage of lymphocytes or lymphocyte stimulation index in renal transplant recipients.

The lymphocyte immunosuppressant-sensitivity test (LIST) has been reported extensively as being able to estimate the pharmacological efficacy of immunosuppressive drugs in individual patients. This study measured the IC50 values for 6 drugs, cyclosporine, tacrolimus, methylprednisolone, 6-mercaptopurine, mycophenolic acid, and mizoribine, against mitogen-induced proliferation of peripheral-blood lymphocytes in 29 renal transplant recipients. We also examined relationship between the IC50 values and 4 factors; age, duration of dialysis, percentage of lymphocytes in total white blood cells, and blastogenesis stimulation index by mitogen. There were no significant correlations between the IC50 values and these factors, except that the tacrolimus IC50 value was correlated weakly with the stimulation index (p<0.05, r=-0.429). It was concluded that the pharmacological efficacy of immunosuppressive drugs cannot be inferred from the patient characteristics or their laboratory data. LIST is an effective method to elucidate the pharmacodynamic properties of immunosuppressive agents in individual renal transplant recipients without being influenced by the recipient clinical data.