Liver Transplantation: State of the Art

Abstract

Starzl carried out the first human liver transplant in 1963, and the first liver graft of the Cambridge/King’s College Hospital series was performed by Calne in 1968. Two other groups with considerable early experience in this field were led by Pichlmayr in Hannover and Krom in Groningen. The data given by these groups and by the other participants in the National Institutes of Health Consensus Development Conference in 1983 led to the following conclusion: “Liver transplantation is a therapeutic modality for end stage liver disease that deserves broader application” (NIHCDC 1984). This has been followed by a very rapid increase in the number of centres in America and Europe which have either initiated or are planning programmes, as well as marked expansion in the already established transplant programmes. Consequently there has been an exponential increase in the number of patients receiving orthotopic liver transplants in Great Britain, Europe and the United States (Fig. 1). This increase in the number of patients transplanted has been matched by a rapid rise in the number of donor organs offered to our liver transplant co-ordinator between 1982 and 1985 (Fig. 2).