US Pharm. 2015;40(4):7.
Toronto, ON—New research suggests that liver transplants from live donors appear to work just as well as traditional transplants for patients with acute liver failure. The study compared live- and deceased-donor liver transplants at Toronto General Hospital over a 7-year period. The two procedures achieved similar results, with 31% of living-donor transplants and 43% of transplants from deceased donors experiencing postsurgical complications. There was also no difference in recipient survival rates up to 5 years post transplant. Without a liver transplant, about 80% of patients will die. This high mortality rate is due to the severe shortage of available livers from recently deceased donors.
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