Best Hospitals for liver transplant

[mathewlsgeorge]

I need to find best places around the world to do a liver transplant for personal friend.Heard that Aster Medcity in India is a good option.Anyone has experience with best Organ Transplant hospitals?.

[jojokarak]

I don't think any one hospital is the best as the people who receive a gift of life consider that hospital to be the best for them personally so I don't think any individual could answer this question.

[RodeoJoe in reply to jojokarak]

If they are considering an Indian hospital I don't imagine they are in the UK. So it would actually be irrelevant if anyone mentioned a UK hospital anyway as they would have to be a UK resident.

I imagine they're looking for a private solution which is not possible in the UK.

[dckimberly]

Unless they are super wealthy, and willing to go certain routes, it's hard to imagine they could just pick and choose.

I am from the USA. I came here to be with my partner at the end. In the US I was not considered a candidate for transplant, so I was stunned when they wanted to asses me, and even more stunned when I was put on the list then received a transplant.

I am a patient at Addenbrookes hospital and am under the team there with Mr.Butler. Not to boast, but he is known the world over as one of the top transplant surgeons. He is the only doctor in the U.K. Who does multi visceral txs. He has transplanted up to five organs at one time from one angel donor into one terminal patient.

I am truly blessed and lucky.

Patients come from all over to get help from Addenbrookes. Doctors on the liver transplant are from all over the world, including specialists who come and stay for six months or so to study and work along side the team. This does not even incrlude the mecival college right there, bringing in the best and brightest to train at Addenbrookes. It's a research hospital also. My surgeon has created a new machine the holds the organ in a different way, allowing it to stay warm, and circulation with fluids and it gets nourished. I'm presently back on the list for another liver and kidney (my new liver is failing mechanically) and I've been chosen to use the new machine. Hopefull this will help the new one do better once in my body.

We drive 90 min. Each way, but boy is it worth it!

Again, I don't think you can just pick a country, unless yr super rich. And you would have to live nearby. For obvious reasons.

Are you in the U.K.? Why would you go to India when the transplant hospitals here are so good? Have you been rejected here? And trust me the black market route is not only criminal, it's amoral. There are studies that some organs that are bought are literally ripped from a healthy donors body, children included. We see this in poorer and over populated nations.

Ive heard Kings is very good also.

Kimberly

[Ninie in reply to dckimberly]

Hi my husband has been at the transplant unit here in our country and they did not want to help . From my understanding he is too old 65yrs and there are no donors. This makes me sad and not being a UK citizen I need to accept it that he will not get the gift of life.

[bobbycat in reply to Ninie]

that is sad. Where do you come from? In the UK cut off is 70.

[Ninie in reply to bobbycat]

South Africa

[RodeoJoe in reply to dckimberly]

Hi Kimberley hope your doing as well as can be expected.

As you say I think you can possibly pay for transplant even here in the UK. But of course transplants differ from almost any other surgery in that it requires a donor organ. Making it profitable has all kinds of moral and ethical implications.

From what I understand the UK shares it's transplant resources based on priority, if nobody needs a liver then I think it might be offered to the EU (at which point I imagine logistics become an issue). At this point if there are no takers I believe non UK residents are offered the liver. However as you can imagine and because there is already a shortage of organs already this rarely becomes the case.

[dckimberly in reply to RodeoJoe]

Yes, I'm a very lucky girl. I know that, but I am on a visa and on the pathway to citizenship. I am ready to give up my American citizenship at any time..especially now. I no longer even recognize the country I was raised in. I was surprised to go n the list, as you know and was only on it for three and half months prior to surgery. Crazy!

No, I was concerned the person above might be willing to take certain routes that are not good, not the regular.

Hope your doing welll also sweetie pie!

O o

Kimberly

[RodeoJoe in reply to dckimberly]

You might have got the wrong end of the stick. I wasn't questioning your entitlement, just saying how I understood it worked.

I do understand your concern's about the OP, and going that route is a moral and ethical maze. Thankfully not something we have to worry about here in the UK.

Yes really well thanks

[pear-shaped]

Dear Mathew,

A patient on our ward had paid for a kidney - in a foreign country - he returned here - developed some complications - when doctors probed further they found that the new kidney had given him a rare strain of Hep C. This was subsequently treated but was such a rare form that the meds didn't work - our beloved friend developed liver disease and very quickly developed schirosis.

He eventually died from kidney failure.

I pray that you and your family are given the strength to face these difficult times.

Pear

[Millie09 in reply to pear-shaped]

Hi pear, so that really happens? Am I right in saying people can randomly pay for an organ from a poor diseased person? That cannot be legal surely? How scary is that 😯

[Geffy22 in reply to Millie09]

Hi Millie, my dad was from hong kong. I am mixed race, my mum is english. When we visited family i asked iif we could take the train to china. He said they'd take my kidneys and sell them. I laughed at him and said no really Id like to go, he absolutely flatly refused, repeated the kudney comment so we didnt go.

My dad hadnt lived in hk for 50 years when we had this exchange, but my dad was the sort of guy who didnt exaggerate and was quite fact based, so he must have had a reason to say it.

I expect the sad thing is that is people are poor, they do what they can to get by and criminals operate globally exploiting the poor....

[Millie09 in reply to Geffy22]

Hi geffy, thank you for your reply, it's awful to think that this actually goes on . Such a sad state of affair isn't it .😐

[pear-shaped]

Dear Millie,

The horror of this is that our poor friend and his Mrs were told by the consultant here (UK) that he is listed for a kidney at the time - but he is very unlikely to get it soon - so a registrar​ told them about a hospital abroad that he knew about and how they can give him a kidney for 30 grand. Well he trusted this doc and went to the hospital and had the kidney transplant. But when he returned found out about this Hep C he had contracted from the new kidney. Well, it rapidly attacked the liver and eventually killed him.

I also know of another family who went to India to pay for a liver transplant but when they got back - their loved one died - the autopsy showed that it wasn't a human liver!

Sorry for the horror stories - they are true and only happen because they take advantage of these vulnerable people.

Pear

[Millie09 in reply to pear-shaped]

Wow! How awful. I can understand as Geffy22 mentioned above regarding poor people having to go to such extremities , but how terrible that in this day and age it has come to this .words fail me and as to the so called surgeon using a non human liver?? .... terrible. Thank you for your reply pear shaped

[Frankle]

Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans. In 2015 it was the largest liver transplant program in the US.