Organ transplantation is a very complicated medical procedure. The organ has to be compatible with the recipient, and the process also involves moving a live organ from donor person to recipient and maintaining the organ in working order until the surgery.
The traditional method of moving transplant organs involves storing them at a very low temperature. However, this process has a time limit and may damage organ tissues.
Read more in Medical News Today.
It is new technology called “liver in a box,” and it’s improving outcomes for patients who receive lifesaving transplants.
April is National Donate Life Month, which helps raise awareness about the importance of organ donation. According to Lifesource, more than 11,000 people in the U.S. are waiting for a lifesaving liver donation. Read more in Medical Xpress.
April is National Donate Life Month. It’s observed to help raise awareness about the importance of organ donation.
In the U.S., it’s estimated that 4.5 million adults are diagnosed with chronic liver disease. It develops over time and may be caused by a number of conditions including, hepatitis, genetics, alcohol overuse or cancer. Chronic liver disease is different than acute liver disease, which can come on quickly and may be the result of an injury or a virus. Read the full story from the Mayo Clinic here.
– Post-transplant survival similar between recipients with active or prior HCV infection
With the advent of direct-acting antiviral therapy for hepatitis C virus (HCV) in the post-liver transplant setting, we are seeing more and more HCV-infected donor livers offered to patients awaiting liver transplant. Post-liver transplant outcomes for patients with HCV-associated hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) who receive HCV-infected donor livers are not well established.
A recent study, published in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, utilized the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) registry to classify patients with HCV-related HCC (with either prior infection or active viremia) who received HCV-infected donor livers. Overall, the post-liver transplant survival outcomes were similar between recipients with active HCV infection and those with prior infection. Clinically, this study supports consideration of expanded use of HCV-infected liver donation to improve access to liver transplantation. Read more on MedPage Today.
MICHIGAN MEDICINE HEADLINES> OUR EMPLOYEES
March 28, 2022 // FOUND IN: Our Employees, Top Story
At first glance, it looked just like another liver transplant surgery at Michigan Medicine. There were surgeons, fellows, anesthesiologists, scrub nurses and more crowded into the operating room, prepping the patient and carrying out the hours-long procedure.
But this was no ordinary surgery. Read the full story.
Liver transplants save lives. I know because my life was saved by one.
As a liver transplant hepatologist, I’ve spent my career taking care of patients who are waiting for or have received a lifesaving liver transplant. But in 2002, my world was turned upside down: I was given the gift of life when I myself became a liver transplant recipient.
Read more.
Adifficult day turned around for Dr. Dinee Simpson after she unexpectedly ran into a former patient of hers when she grabbed some coffee, as detailed in a now-viral tweet.
“Woman next to me stared at my ID badge and started to cry,” read Simpson’s tweet, which has more than 272,000 likes at the time of publication. “I did her liver transplant last year, she was so sick then. Today she had her hair did, makeup on, and looked FABULOUS.”
Read the full story.
Liver transplant recipients with daptomycin-resistant Enterococcus bacteremia were more than twice as likely to die within a year compared with those who had vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus bacteremia, a study found.
“In our institution, we noted a significant increase in Enterococcus isolates resistant to daptomycin, leaving few options for treatment,” Rachael A. Lee, MD, MSPH, associate professor of infectious diseases at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, told Healio.
Read more.
The college roommates had not seen each other in 21 years. But when Steven Robinson realized on a family trip to Detroit that he was within driving distance of Richard Koonce, he called his friend to ask if he could visit.
Koonce had introduced Robinson to his wife, Natalie, when they all attended Norfolk State University, a historically Black college in Virginia. When his old friend reached out he welcomed the couple and their three children to his home in Sandusky, Ohio, last summer.
Read the full story.
Younger age and use of a certain immunosuppressive agent were more than three times as likely to be associated with higher risk of recurrent autoimmune hepatitis (AIH) after liver transplantation, researchers found.
Among 736 AIH patients who received a liver transplant over a 33-year period, adjusted analyses showed the following factors were associated with a greater risk of recurrent disease:
– Age 42 or younger at transplantation (HR 3.15, 95% CI 1.22-8.16, P=0.02)
– Using mycophenolate mofetil after transplantation (HR 3.06, 95% CI 1.39-6.73, P=0.005)
– Sex mismatch between donor and recipient (HR 2.57, 95% CI 1.39-4.76, P=0.003)
– High IgG levels before transplantation (HR 1.04, 95% CI 1.01-1.06, P=0.004)
Read the full article here.