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Incidence, impact, and treatment of portal and hepatic venous complications following pediatric liver transplantation: A single-center 12 year experience
Pediatric transplantation
  • Thomas Heffron
  • Todd Pillen
  • Gregory Smallwood, Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine
  • Stuart Henry
  • Sundari Sekar
  • Katherine Casper
  • David Solis
  • Wenhao Tang
  • Carlos Fasola
  • Rene Romero
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
1-1-2010
Abstract

PVT or PVS and HVOO are known causes of graft and patient loss after pediatric liver transplantation. Increased incidences of these complications have been reported in partial livers including DDSLT or LDLT. From 1997 to 2008, 241 consecutive pediatric patients received 271 hepatic grafts at a single center. Median follow-up is 1856 days. Surgical technique, demographics, lab values, and radiologic imaging procedures were obtained utilizing OTTR ® to evaluate the relationship of portal and hepatic complications with risk factors, patient and graft survival. Grafts were composed of 115271 (42.4%) partial livers of which 90 (33.2%) were DDSLT and 25 (9.2%) LDLT. Of 271 patients, 156 (57.6%) received whole-sized grafts. There were six PVC in five patients with one patient requiring retransplantation (0.34%) and no patient deaths. Utilizing all three hepatic vein orifices on the recipient hepatic vena cava and the donor hepatic vein cut short enables a wide hepatic outflow tract unlikely to twist. None of the 241 patients developed early or late complications of the hepatic vein. None of the last 128 consecutive patients who received 144 grafts over seven and a half yr have developed either early or late complications of the hepatic or portal vein. Partial-graft actuarial survival was similar to whole-graft survival (87.2% vs. 85.3% at one yr; 76.6% vs. 80.2 at three yr; p = 0.488). Likewise, patient survival was similar between partial grafts and whole grafts (93.8% vs. 93.1% at one yr; 89.8% vs. 87.2% at three yr; p = 0.688) with median follow-up of 1822 (±1334) days. Patients receiving partial livers were significantly younger and smaller than patients receiving whole livers (p < 0.001). Portal and hepatic venous complications may have negative effects on patient or graft survival after pediatric liver transplantation. In our series, there was one graft and no patient loss related to portal or hepatic venous complications after pediatric liver transplantation over 12 yr. © 2010 John Wiley & Sons AS.

Comments

This article was published in Pediatric transplantation, Volume 14, Issue 6, Pages 722-729.

The published version is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1399-3046.2009.01259.x.

Copyright © 2010 Wiley.

Citation Information
Thomas Heffron, Todd Pillen, Gregory Smallwood, Stuart Henry, et al.. "Incidence, impact, and treatment of portal and hepatic venous complications following pediatric liver transplantation: A single-center 12 year experience" Pediatric transplantation Vol. 14 Iss. 6 (2010) p. 722 - 729
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/gregory_smallwood/39/