S-adenosylmethionine does not reduce ischaemia-reperfusion injury to a marginal liver graft in an in vivo experiment.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: There are a limited number of appropriate cadaver liver donors. One possible solution is the use of marginal liver grafts from cadaver donors for liver transplantation.

METHODOLOGY: Rats with liver steatosis were divided into four containing seven animals each: I-a: steatotic liver grafts; +S-adenosylmethionine; I-b: steatotic liver grafts were transplanted; no S-adenosylmethionine; II-a: normal liver grafts, +S-adenosylmethionine; II-b: normal liver grafts. Blood samples were taken at days -1, 3 and 14.

RESULTS

ALT values at day 14: 1.75 ± 1.10µkat/L (in group I-a), 1.91 ± 1.41µkat/L (in group I-b), 2.13±1.85µkat/L (in group II-a) and 2.08 ± 1.35µkat/L (in group II-b). There were no significant differences between these values. GSH values at day 14 post-transplantation were: 44.90 ± 8.61µM/mg (in group I-a), 43.82±8.58µM/mg (in group I-b), 41.65 ± 4.87µM/mg (in group II-a) and 42.71 ± 4.17µM/mg (in control group II-b).

CONCLUSIONS

Our study did not demonstrate the positive effect of S-adenosylmethionine on ischaemia-reperfusion injury during liver transplantation in rats.