Extremely marginal liver grafts from deceased donors have outcome similar to ideal grafts.

BACKGROUND

Although there is a worldwide need to expand the donor pool, many cadaveric marginal livers are usually discarded for transplantation. Herein, we report the outcome of a series of patients receiving marginal grafts.

METHODS

We analyzed all patients who underwent liver transplantation in our unit from August 2006 to March 2011 (n = 125) with the use of a prospectively collected database. Patients with ≥3 of donor (prolonged hypotensive episodes, donor age >55 years, high vasopressor drug requirement, hypernatremia, prolonged intensive care unit stay, elevated transaminases) and graft-related (cold ischemia >12 hours, warm ischemia time >40 minutes and steatosis >30%) extended criteria were defined as extremely marginal liver grafts (EMLG). The outcomes of patients receiving EMLG were compared with the recipients of grafts without any marginal criteria (ideal grafts).

RESULTS

The EMLG group (n = 36) showed higher operative transfusion requirement (66.6% vs 55.6%) as well as 30-day (11.1% vs 55%) and 1-year (22.2% vs 5.5%) mortality rates, compared with the ideal grafts group (n = 18) but without a significant difference. Other variables, such as major complications, postoperative hemodialysis, ICU and hospital stay, and 1-year survival also were not significantly different.

CONCLUSIONS

The liver pool can be safely expanded using EMLG from deceased donors for liver transplantation. These usually discarded liver grafts showed similar early and long-term outcomes compared with ideal organs.