Kyung Rae Kim, Gi‐Young Ko, Kyu‐Bo Sung, Hyun‐Ki Yoon, Ji Hoon Shin, Ho‐Young Song, Je‐Ho Ryu, Shin Hwang, Sung‐Gyu Lee, Eunsil Yu – 25 June 2008 – Transjugular liver biopsy (TJLB) is an alternative method of pathological diagnosis in patients with an established contraindication to percutaneous biopsy. Between November 2005 and July 2007, 111 TJLBs were attempted in 67 patients and 95 percutaneous liver biopsies (PCLBs) were attempted in 51 patients with living donor liver transplantation suspected of having rejection.

Andre M. De Wolf – 25 June 2008

Yasutsugu Takada, Takashi Ito, Yoshihide Ueda, Hironori Haga, Hiroto Egawa, Koichi Tanaka, Shinji Uemoto – 25 June 2008 – Response rates to interferon and ribavirin treatment for recipients with recurrent hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection are suboptimal, particularly for those with genotype 1b and high viral load. The present study evaluated the effects of combining double‐filtration plasmapheresis (DFPP) with pharmacotherapy using interferon plus ribavirin after living donor liver transplantation.

Geoffrey M. Fleming, Timothy T. Cornell, Theodore H. Welling, John C. Magee, Gail M. Annich – 25 June 2008 – Hepatopulmonary syndrome is an uncommon complication of nonacute liver failure, and in rare cases, hypoxia may be the presenting sign of liver dysfunction. The condition, once thought to be a contraindication, is improved in most cases by transplantation. There is a significant risk of postoperative, hypoxia‐related morbidity and mortality in patients with hepatopulmonary syndrome.

Cristiano Quintini, Federico Aucejo, Charles M. Miller – 25 June 2008

Ilona T. A. Pereboom, Ton Lisman, Robert J. Porte – 25 June 2008 – Apart from the well‐known role of blood platelets in hemostasis, there is emerging evidence that platelets have various nonhemostatic properties that play a critical role in inflammation, angiogenesis, tissue repair and regeneration, and ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury. All these processes may be involved in the (patho)physiological alterations occurring in patients undergoing liver transplantation.

Denise Herzog, Dorothée Bouron‐Dal Soglio, Jean‐Christophe Fournet, Steven Martin, Denis Marleau, Fernando Alvarez – 25 June 2008 – Chronic graft dysfunction, manifesting with elevated liver enzymes and histological features of interface hepatitis (IH), is being increasingly recognized as a long‐term problem after liver transplantation. The aim of this study was to characterize our group of post–orthotopic liver transplantation (OLT) patients with respect to clinical, laboratory, and histological signs of IH.

Salvatore Petta, Calogero Cammà, Vito Di Marco, Nicola Alessi, Francesco Barbaria, Daniela Cabibi, Rosalia Caldarella, Stefania Ciminnisi, Anna Licata, Maria Fatima Massenti, Alessandra Mazzola, Giuseppe Tarantino, Giulio Marchesini, Antonio Craxì – 20 June 2008 – Retinol‐binding protein 4 (RBP4) is an adipocytokine associated with insulin resistance (IR). We tested serum levels of RBP4 to assess its link with steatosis in patients with genotype 1 chronic hepatitis C (CHC) or nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD).

Nadia Warner, Stephen Locarnini – 20 June 2008 – The hepatitis B virus (HBV) mutation that encodes rtA181T is selected in the viral polymerase during antiviral drug therapy and can also encode a stop codon in the overlapping surface gene at amino acid 172 (sW172*) resulting in truncation of the last 55 amino acids of the C‐terminal hydrophobic region of the surface proteins. This mutation is usually detected as a mixed population with wild‐type HBV.

C.‐Thomas Bock, Joseph Torresi – 20 June 2008