Liver transplantation : official publication of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases and the International Liver Transplantation Society
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In the United Kingdom, liver transplantation using donation after circulatory determination of death (DCDD) organs has increased steadily over the last few years and now accounts for 20% of UK transplant activity. The procurement of DCDD livers is actively promoted as a means of increasing the donor pool and bridging the evolving disparity between the wait-list length and the number of transplants performed. The objective of this retrospective study of a cohort of patients who were matched for age, liver disease etiology, and Model for End-Stage Liver Disease score was to determine whether differences in perioperative costs and resource utilization are associated with the use of such organs. ⋯ The overall quality of DCDD grafts is poorer; as a result, the length of the ITU stay and the need for multiorgan support are increased, and this has significant financial and resource implications. We believe that these implications require a careful real-life consideration of benefits. It is essential for DCDD not to be seen as a like-for-like alternative to DBD and for every effort to be continued to be made to increase the number of donations from brain-dead patients as a first resort.
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The aim of this study was to investigate the role of gadolinium ethoxybenzyl diethylenetriamine pentaacetic acid (Gd-EOB-DTPA)-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in predicting the histological grade of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) according to the hepatic function. Eighty-one consecutive patients with 122 histologically proven HCCs who underwent Gd-EOB-DTPA-enhanced MRI before resection (45 HCCs in 42 patients) or transplantation (77 HCCs in 39 patients) were analyzed retrospectively. We calculated the relative enhancement ratios (RER), which is the ratio of the relative intensity of a tumor versus the surrounding parenchyma on hepatobiliary phase images to the relative intensity on unenhanced MRI scans. ⋯ In a subgroup analysis based on liver function, the correlation between the histological grade and the enhancement ratio was demonstrated only in the group of patients with Child-Pugh class A cirrhosis. The accuracy of postcontrast RIRs for predicting WD and PD HCCs was favorable; the areas under the receiver operating characteristic curves were 0.896 [95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.817-0.974] and 0.769 (95% CI = 0.658-0.879), respectively. In conclusion, the hepatobiliary phase of Gd-EOB-DTPA-enhanced MRI may help to predict the differentiation of HCCs, especially in HCC patients with Child-Pugh class A cirrhosis before liver transplantation or resection.