Comparison of the short-term outcomes of liver transplant recipients receiving liver grafts from brain-death and non-heart-beating donors

OBJECTIVE: To compare the short-term outcomes of liver transplantation recipients receiving liver grafts from brain-death and non-heart-beating donors and evaluate the safety of liver grafts from brain-death donors. METHODS: A total of 130 patients receiving liver transplantation between January, 2006 and December, 2007 were retrospectively analyzed, including 9 patients receiving liver graft from brain-death donors and 121 with grafts from non-heart-beating donors. The operative time, anhepatic time, bleeding volume, postoperative complications and short-term survival were compared between the two groups. RESULTS: The operative time, anhepatic time, bleeding volume, postoperative complications and short-term survival showed no significant differences between the two groups. CONCLUSION: The short-term outcome of recipients receiving liver grafts from brain-death donors is similar to that of recipients receiving grafts from non-heart-beating donors, indicating the safety of clinical use of the liver grafts from brain-death donors.