Medical Tourism for a Liver Transplant

[Gumby2014]

Does anyone know anything about availability/what country/how you would start the process?

[Hidden]

The British Liver Trust would only advocate obtaining services via the GP service or NHS.

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[ThreeSmiles in reply to Hidden]

You did a great job of remembering all of that - almost verbatim! Good job feckle........

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Thank you!

[Mama41]

I had a friend who went to India for a live liver transplant(a family member donated part of his liver)

Unfortunately it was unsuccessful but India may be a starting point for you.

[alfredthegreat]

Hi Gumby

Someone that I spoke to a few months ago has in -laws in India. His mother in law donated half of her liver to his father in law. The operation was successful for the father in law, the mother in law has suffered with nerve pain ever since the op a few years ago.

The operation cost £40,000 and that was just the operation costs because they obviously didn't have to pay for a liver .Also any follow up medication like Tacrolimus has to be paid for privately.

Apparently the transplant surgeons there are very proficient because they don't have to spend time on admin so they just concentrate on operations and they develop their expertise very quickly as they are generally doing more transplants than surgeons in most other countries.

Hope this information is of some help to you.

Wishing you all the best with it all.

Alf

[ThreeSmiles in reply to alfredthegreat]

...and then what if there are real problems afterwards..🙁

[alfredthegreat in reply to ThreeSmiles]

Hi Milo.

These people live in India so anything to do with the transplant that's been paid privately for, I would imagine, incur private costs.

I'm not sure how a person would fare if they travelled over there, had the transplant and then returned. I would imagine that any ongoing problems would be treated by the national health. Obviously a fair bit of research to be done by anyone planning this.

[ThreeSmiles in reply to alfredthegreat]

Sounds fraught to me 👎

[Hidden in reply to alfredthegreat]

Inevitably the NHS will have to pick up the pieces but they will try to sent you back to the specialist who performed the initial op. For1. It's always for better for that individual to go back in and investigate rather than NHS fumbling about in the dark. 2. NHS will not always have the speciality to hand. You'll simply end up with a Generalized surgeon who will attempt to liaise with the overseas specialist. 3. Cost. & 4. Doesn't work in emergency cases.

My wife's gastro op was messed up by a Private hospital. In an emergency not fit to travel nor wishing to go back to the butcher's luckily the Local NHS surgeon was able to call upon a friend (another Private specialist) to help.

Merely one of many ops to deal with the mess and subsequent complications. Bottom line she has never got back to full health. 🤔👎

[Hidden]

Hi,

Ofekman has already kindly posted the extract from our community guidelines regarding this query.

We would also suggest to discuss this with your liver specialist, they really would be best to advise.

Wishing you well...

Trust1

[summerc23]

I’m sure there’s lots of legality’s and ethics to going abroad for a transplant. Are you not eligible for a transplant in this county?

[Gumby2014 in reply to summerc23]

Actually, I'm a U.S. citizen. My problem is that I'm 76 years old. While I am otherwise in very good health and unbelievably active, my age is almost certainly the ultimate roadblock.

[TT-2018 in reply to Gumby2014]

I fail to understand why your citizenship is relevant to your health concerns, poor health has no boundaries.

You are active and in good health, by your own words.

Perhaps you should consider counselling to try and understand that you should be grateful for your health and active retirement.

[AyrshireK]

As you arn't very symptomatic and bloods are relatively normal then no matter your age you wouldn't qualify or be even needy of transplant. Have you actually been medically diagnosed with cirrhosis?

My husbands consultant has people on his books with a diagnosis of cirrhosis for 20+ years who are no closer to needing transplant (my hubby at 58 has cirrhosis - diagnosed April 2012 and not a candidate for tranplant currently) . He was listed in 2014 but delisted when his liver stabilized.

If you live clean and healthy and whatever caused any liver damage is dealt with then your liver is still capable of going on for years with a compensated cirrhotic liver.

Katie