Projekt för examensarbete
The change in donor profile over the past two decades and its impact on the early and late
results after liver transplantation
Liver transplantation has become a safe procedure and an established therapeutic alternative for
patients with irreversible liver failure, with one-year survival in excess of 80%. These excellent
outcomes lead to an increase in referrals for transplantation but resulted in an ever-expanding waiting
list. As a logical consequence, the longer the list of patients waiting for a liver transplant the larger the
need for more organs for transplantation. Tackling this increased demand of liver grafts requires
innovative technical solutions as well as accepting more brain-dead individuals as liver donors. Older
donors, donors with liver steatosis or donors with hypernatremia (commonly called extended criteria
donors) usually have a higher Donor Risk Index (DRI) but are sometimes used for transplantation.
The study will explore the change in donor profile assessed using the donor risk index (DRI) and
several lab tests. The results will be analyzed with respect to the early and late results.
All liver transplantations performed in 1995, 2000, 2005 and 2010 will be studied. Donor information
will be retrieved from the organ donation chart and the DRI will be calculated. Recipient information
(e.g., MELD score, diagnosis), one month and one year graft and patient survival and cause of graft
failure will be recorded.
The analysis will provide an overview of the ongoing effort to expand the liver donor pool and the
results using extended criteria donors for liver transplantation. Moreover, the study could identify the
most adequate diagnosis and recipient group most likely to benefit from using extended criteria
donors.