QE Birmingham Liver transplant news.

I was at a meeting last night with the Liver transplant Support Group at the QE.

One of the items of discussion, involved the new liver transplant perfusion machine which was licensed for use back in January of this year. It has since been realised that although this machine is a wonderful piece or kit, it does apparently put a strain the blood bank resources.

A new trial is about to be launched once funding is obtained, to use synthetic blood instead. This may well certainly help those organs and donors who have to travel long distances such as Wales and Liverpool etc, and keep the livers alive without placing a burden upon over stretched blood supplies.

[alfredthegreat]

The perfusion machine started in use at Addenbrookes Hospital in May last year. My transplant was Aug Bank Holiday. I arrived at the hospital sometime after 2am. I had to go on a drip as there was some level in my blood that had to be lowered before I could go to theatre. I remember the surgeon coming to see me at around 4am and saying "The donor liver is on the machine and everything is looking good". At that time I thought that this was something that happened at all hospitals, part of the transplant procedure so to speak. It was about a further four hours before my blood was deemed ok for me to go to theatre. After my transplant when I learned all about the perfusion machine, I then realised that had it not been for that wonderful machine there was a chance that in my case that the donor liver might not have been viable for use because of deterioration caused over the length of time involved sorting my blood. These machines are a huge step forward and I hope that all liver transplant hospitals have them in use very soon. They will make a massive difference to the number of transplants that go ahead. Great news that synthetic blood can be used and the machine will not be reliant on already stretched blood supplies. Thanks for the update Richard. Alf.