Elizabeth M. Brunt – 7 June 2017 – Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is one of the most common underlying causes of chronically elevated liver tests and liver disease in adults and children worldwide and may be strongly suspected if not diagnosed by ever evolving and available serologic and imaging‐based noninvasive tests.
Erin K. Spengler, Lawrence G. Hunsicker, Sanam Zarei, M. Bridget Zimmerman, Michael D. Voigt – 7 June 2017 – Physicians often exclude patients with a model for end‐stage liver disease (MELD) score ≥ 18 from a transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS) procedure due to the concern for higher risk of death. We aimed to determine if TIPS increased the risk of death in these patients. We analyzed the interaction between TIPS and MELD in 106 patients with TIPS and 79 with intractable ascites without TIPS.
Ping‐Chun Li, Ashok Thorat, Long‐Bin Jeng – 7 June 2017
Carlos Moctezuma‐Velazquez, Sylvia Kalainy, Juan G. Abraldes – 7 June 2017 – Nonselective beta‐blockers (NSBBs) have been the backbone for the treatment of portal hypertension in cirrhosis for the last 3 decades. A publication in 2010 of a prospective observational study suggested that NSBBs could increase mortality in patients with refractory ascites. This opened a controversy about the safety and efficacy of NSBBs in patients with advanced liver disease and led to the publication of a large corpus of observational data assessing the safety of NSBBs in patients with advanced cirrhosis.
Xiao Zhi, Fei Xue, Wei Chen, Chao Liang, Hao Liu, Tao Ma, Xuefeng Xia, Liqiang Hu, Xueli Bai, Tingbo Liang – 7 June 2017 – Despite its rarity (1%‐2%), acute graft‐versus‐host disease after liver transplantation (LT‐aGVHD) has a high mortality rate (85%). A gradual decrease in regulatory T cells (Tregs) correlates with disease progression in a rat LT‐GVHD model, and treatments which increase Tregs exert therapeutic effects on LT‐aGVHD. In this study, LT‐aGVHD model rats were treated with rapamycin (RAPA), OSI‐027, or an equal quantity of vehicle.
Avegail Flores, Sumeet K. Asrani – 7 June 2017 – In 2006, derivation of the donor risk index (DRI) highlighted the importance of donor factors for successful liver transplantation. Over the last decade, the DRI has served as a useful metric of donor quality and has enhanced our understanding of donor factors and their impact upon recipients with hepatitis C virus, those with low Model for End‐Stage Liver Disease (MELD) score, and individuals undergoing retransplantation.
Toshihiro Kitajima, Seisuke Sakamoto, Kengo Sasaki, Hajime Uchida, Soichi Narumoto, Akinari Fukuda, Satoshi Teramukai, Shinji Uemoto, Mureo Kasahara – 7 June 2017 – After decades of dramatic surgical innovations in pediatric living donor liver transplantation (LDLT), LDLT for biliary atresia (BA) still poses various challenges. This study reviewed our experience with LDLT for children with post‐Kasai BA and evaluated outcomes and prognostic factors. From 2005 to 2016, 168 post‐Kasai BA LDLT patients were enrolled and divided into 3 groups by age.
Manuel Mendizabal, Marcelo O. Silva – 7 June 2017 – The development of consortia has been useful for exploring challenging scenarios and uncharted territories in liver disease treatments. Several consortia already developed in the United States and Europe have become key factors in patient care decision‐making processes and medical education, and they have also impacted policy makers' decisions. In Latin America, the situation is different.
Guangqin Xiao, Sixian Zhu, Xiao Xiao, Lunan Yan, Jiayin Yang, Gang Wu – 6 June 2017 – Many noninvasive methods for diagnosing liver fibrosis (LF) have been proposed. To determine the best method for diagnosing LF in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), we conducted a systemic review and meta‐analysis to compare the performance of aspartate aminotransferase to platelets ratio index (APRI), fibrosis‐4 index (FIB‐4), BARD score, NAFLD fibrosis score (NFS), FibroScan, shear wave elastography (SWE), and magnetic resonance elastography (MRE) for diagnosing LF in NAFLD.
Roland Amathieu, Ali Al‐Khafaji, Florentina E. Sileanu, Emily Foldes, Rebecca DeSensi, Ibtesam Hilmi, John A. Kellum – 6 June 2017 – Clinical guidelines recommend using Kidney Disease Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) criteria for the diagnosis and classification of acute kidney injury (AKI) in patients with chronic liver disease (CLD). Concerns have been raised about the use of urine output (UO) criteria in CLD. We examined the significance of oliguria meeting the urine output criteria for AKI (AKI‐UO) and examined its association with clinical outcomes in CLD patients.