Andrew J. Muir, Linda L. Sanders, Michael A. Heneghan, Paul C. Kuo, William E. Wilkinson, Dawn Provenzale – 30 December 2003 – With the recent transition of the liver transplant allocation system to the Model for End‐Stage Liver Disease, a major change is its reliance entirely on objective criteria. In previous reports, potential donor families and members of the transplant community have questioned the fairness of the subjective nature of previous systems.

Bjørn Brandsæter, Krister Höckerstedt, Styrbjörn Friman, Bo‐Göran Ericzon, Preben Kirkegaard, Helena Isoniemi, Michael Olausson, Ulrika Broome, Lars Schmidt, Aksel Foss, Kristian Bjøro – 30 December 2003 – Fulminant hepatic failure is a common indication for liver transplantation. Outcomes of patients listed for a highly urgent liver transplantation have been studied, with special emphasis on etiology of the liver disease, clinical condition, and ABO blood type. Data have been collected from the Nordic Liver Transplantation Registry.

Glenn A. Krinsky, Vivian S. Lee, Neil D. Theise, Jeffrey C. Weinreb, Glyn R. Morgan, Thomas Diflo, Devon John, Lewis W. Teperman – 30 December 2003 – The sensitivity of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in patients who undergo transplantation for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and cirrhosis is not known. We prospectively evaluated 24 patients with known HCC who underwent MRI and subsequent transplantation within 60 days (mean, 20 days). Using a phased‐array coil at 1.5T, breath‐hold turbo STIR and T2‐weighted MR images were performed.

Pierre‐Alain Clavien, Markus Selzner – 30 December 2003

Federico G. Villamil – 30 December 2003 – 1Patients undergoing orthotopic liver transplantation (OLT) for hepatitis B without effective prophylaxis have a high risk for recurrent infection and severe graft damage, leading to death or re‐OLT.2Long‐term prophylaxis with hepatitis B immune globulin (HBIg) significantly reduces the risk for hepatitis B virus (HBV) recurrence and increases survival.

Marina Berenguer – 30 December 2003

Wael I. Youssef, Kevin D. Mullen – 30 December 2003

Robert J. Fontana, Halimi Hamidullah, Hanh Nghiem, Joel K. Greenson, Hero Hussain, Jorge Marrero, Steve Rudich, Leslie A. McClure, Juan Arenas – 30 December 2003 – The incidence of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is increasing in the United States. Although liver transplantation is an effective means of treating selected patients, pretransplantation tumor progression may preclude some patients from undergoing transplantation.

Mary E. Rinella, Michael M. Abecassis – 30 December 2003

Rahul S. Koti, Wenxuan Yang, Michael R. Dashwood, Brian R. Davidson, Alexander M. Seifalian – 30 December 2003 – Ischemic preconditioning (IPC) may protect the liver from ischemia reperfusion injury by nitric oxide formation. This study has investigated the effect of ischemic preconditioning on hepatic microcirculation (HM), and the relationship between nitric oxide metabolism and HM in preconditioning. Rats were allocated to 5 groups: 1. sham laparotomy; 2. 45 minutes lobar ischemia followed by 2‐hour reperfusion (IR); 3.