Controlled donation after circulatory death up to 80 years for liver transplantation: Pushing the limit again

Temporal Trends in Utilization and Outcomes of DCD Livers in the United States

“…Limited knowledge about the benefits of DCD livers might contribute to these disparities since utilization varies at the center and organ procurement organization (OPO) levels, with higher-volume and aggressive centers being more likely to using these higher-risk organs. 23-25 As the transplant community seeks to use all available organs to mitigate organ shortage, 7,13,15,26-36 ongoing characterization of DCD liver utilization and outcomes is critical to safely maximize DCD LT. 37-40…”

“…Results. DCD livers were more likely to be discarded than DBD livers across the entire study period, and the relative likelihood of discard increased over time (adjusted odds ratio organ shortage, 7,13,15,[26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36] ongoing characterization of DCD liver utilization and outcomes is critical to safely maximize DCD LT. [37][38][39][40] To investigate this further, we used US national registry data to quantify temporal trends and OPO-level variation in discard of DCD livers and to quantify temporal changes in graft survival and mortality related to DCD versus DBD LT.…”

Response to “Controlled donation after circulatory death up to 80 years for liver transplantation: Pushing the limit again”

“…We are grateful for the interest of the group at Cruces Hospital in our work in which we report the results of 32 liver transplants (LT) performed with donation after circulatory death (DCD) donors over 70 years of age and super-rapid recovery, 1 who provided an analysis of our data and expressed the opinion that our observed survival per year was less than the current standards. 2 We understand the standard used by the Cruces group in comparing our results to benchmark. In the setting of severe shortage of organs, we believe that the use of these livers leads to more transplants and, therefore, more opportunities for potential recipients.…”