Elizabeth J. Carey, David D. Douglas, Vijayan Balan, Hugo E. Vargas, Thomas J. Byrne, Adyr A. Moss, David C. Mulligan – 22 March 2004 – Hepatopulmonary syndrome (HPS) is a progressive, debilitating complication of end‐stage liver disease. In contrast to the well‐established reversal of HPS after deceased donor liver transplantation (DDLT), little has been written about the natural course of HPS after the newer procedure of living donor liver transplantation (LDLT). We describe HPS in a small series of 4 liver transplant recipients (2 DDLT; 2 LDLT) at a single center.

Marc H. Dahlke, Felix C. Popp, Stephen Larsen, Hans J. Schlitt, John E.J. Rasko – 22 March 2004 – Various stem cell populations have been described in distinct models of liver regeneration. This review provides an overview of these different stem cell populations aimed at unifying diverse views of liver stem cell biology. Embryonic stem cells, hemopoietic stem cells, mesenchymal stem cells, liver‐derived hepatic stem cells, bone marrow–derived hepatic stem cells, and mature hepatocytes (as cells with stemlike properties) are considered separately.

Aya Miyagawa‐Hayashino, Tatsuaki Tsuruyama, Hironori Haga, Fimitaka Oike, Kim Il‐Deok, Hiroto Egawa, Hiroshi Hiai, Koichi Tanaka, Toshiaki Manabe – 22 March 2004 – Chronic rejection is an important cause of liver allograft failures. The allograft undergoing chronic rejection shows affected large‐ and medium‐sized muscular arteries with homing of foamy macrophages and enlargement of the intimal area.

Christine E. Staatz, Paul J. Taylor, Stephen V. Lynch, Susan E. Tett – 22 March 2004 – Although monitoring of tacrolimus blood concentrations is standard clinical practice following liver transplantation, a greater understanding of the relationship between trough concentrations and clinical outcome is required. The aim of this study was to perform a pharmacodynamic investigation of tacrolimus in pediatric liver transplant recipients. A retrospective analysis was performed on 35 pediatric liver recipients who received oral tacrolimus as the primary immunosuppressant.

Katarína Vajdová, Stefan Heinrich, Yinghua Tian, Rolf Graf, Pierre‐Alain Clavien – 22 March 2004 – The aim of this study was to evaluate whether the protective effect of intermittent clamping and ischemic preconditioning is related to an improved hepatic microcirculation after ischemia/reperfusion injury. Male C57BL/6 mice were subjected to 75 or 120 min of hepatic ischemia and 1 or 3 hours of reperfusion.

Raman Venkataramanan, Leslie M. Shaw – 22 March 2004

Masahide Yazaki, Yasuhiko Hashikura, Yo‐ichi Takei, Toshihiko Ikegami, Shin‐ichi Miyagawa, Kanji Yamamoto, Takahiko Tokuda, Keiko Kobayashi, Takeyori Saheki, Shu‐ichi Ikeda – 22 March 2004 – More than 20 patients with adult‐onset type II citrullinemia have undergone liver transplantation, showing dramatic therapeutic effects. In Japan, living donor liver transplantation is the standard technique of liver transplantation because of the rare availability of cadaveric donors.

Chung‐Mau Lo, Siu‐Tim Cheung, Irene Oi‐Lin Ng, Chi‐Leung Liu, Ching‐Lung Lai, Sheung‐Tat Fan – 22 March 2004 – Fibrosing cholestatic hepatitis (FCH) is a peculiar variant of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection in immunocompromised patients characterized by rapid viral replication. Posttransplant patients receiving lamivudine for prophylaxis or treatment of HBV infection may develop drug resistance due to viral mutants, but FCH is rare because escape mutants are usually replication deficient.

Yasuhiko Sugawara, Masatoshi Makuuchi, Nobuhisa Akamatsu, Yoji Kishi, Takashi Niiya, Junichi Kaneko, Hiroshi Imamura, Norihiro Kokudo – 22 March 2004 – Short and direct vein anastomosis is generally performed in living donor liver transplantation using a right liver graft. The graft will regenerate, however, and might thus compress the anastomosis. We formulated a strategy for outflow reconstruction in right liver graft. When reconstruction of multiple short hepatic veins was necessary, a cryopreserved inferior vena cava graft was anastomosed with the hepatic veins of the graft in a basin.

Sasan Roayaie, Jonathan D. Schwartz, Max W. Sung, Sukru H. Emre, Charles M. Miller, Gabriel E. Gondolesi, Nancy R. Krieger, Myron E. Schwartz – 22 March 2004 – Very little is known about the natural history, effects of therapy, and survival after recurrence of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) after liver transplantation. All adult patients undergoing liver transplant from September 19, 1988, until September 19, 2002, were reviewed. Only patients with histologically proven HCC in the explant who subsequently developed recurrence were included in further analysis.