Abstract
Background: Living donor liver transplantation has the advantage of avoiding the long waiting time for cadaveric liver transplantation with possibility of decreasing mortality before liver transplantation. Objective: To identify the mortality in patients with decompensated cirrhosis with potential living donor during the evaluation process for both donors and recipients before liver transplantation. Methods: We retrospectively reviewed our records for patients with liver cirrhosis requiring liver transplantation that has a potential donor, the number of donors evaluated for each candidate, the mortality during the evaluation process either related to complication of liver disease or progression of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Results: Out of 370 liver cirrhosis patients with potential living donor for liver transplantation, 102 died (27.6%), 79 died related to complication of liver disease and 23 related to HCC progression. The mortality increased as the number of donors evaluated increase, it was 27.6% for patients with one or two donors (86 out of4=311), 37% for patients with 3 donors evaluated (13 out of 35), and 50% with five or seven donors evaluated (2 out of 4). We do not have a MELD limit for living donor and patients with MELD >25 are discussed in case to case bases, and the donor work up time from 2 to 18 days (average 10 days). Conclusion: The mortality is high in patients with potential living donor liver transplantation, with increase in mortality as the number of potential donors increase.