A growing demand for transplant physicians for lung transplantation in Japan

Abstract

Lung transplant (LTX) has evolved dramatically over the last decades and has become a valuable option for patients with advanced pulmonary disease. Because of the limited number of LTX, all transplant processes starting from listing candidates, followed by a transplant procedure, to immunosuppressive therapy after transplantation have been managed only by thoracic surgeons in Japan. Given the current increase in the number of LTX, there is a growing demand for transplant physicians who take care of the non-surgical management of candidates and recipients. To this end, we have surveyed how devoted thoracic surgeons are to pre-, peri- and post-transplant management and how respirologists are currently involved in LTX in all transplant centers. This report presents an overview of the workload in LTX management on both thoracic surgeons and respirologists. Additionally, we document the training program specialized for lung transplant physicians that was established at Tohoku University Hospital in 2021. Although Japan has taken steps towards an increasing number of LTX, there remains a challenge to explore how respirologists participate in transplant care in Japan.