Skip to main content

ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Transplant.
Sec. Abdominal Transplantation
Volume 3 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/frtra.2024.1415141

Predictors for Postoperative Dysphagia in Liver Transplant Recipients

Provisionally accepted
Marian Isdahl Marian Isdahl 1Lily Katz Lily Katz 1Michaela Johnson Ms Ccc-Slp Michaela Johnson Ms Ccc-Slp 1,2Glen Leverson Glen Leverson 3David P. Al-Adra David P. Al-Adra 4*Susan Thibeault Susan Thibeault 1
  • 1 Division of Otolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery, Department of Surgery, University of Wisconsin, Madison, United States
  • 2 Department of Brain and Spine, University of Tennessee Medical Center, Knoxville, TN, United States
  • 3 Department of Surgery, School of Medicine and Public Health, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, United States
  • 4 University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, United States

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Liver transplant recipients are at a heightened risk for oropharyngeal dysphagia; identification of those who are at high risk for postoperative dysphagia could reduce hospital costs and length of stay. We sought to identify predictors of dysphagia, in a large cohort of patients who underwent liver transplantation. Electronic medical records were queried for patients undergoing liver transplantation, who underwent instrumental swallowing evaluations. Demographics, functional outcomes, and interventions were collected. Logistic regression analyses were performed to identify predictors of dysphagia. Seven hundred and ninety-five patients met inclusionary criteria. Multivariate analyses found ethnic group (p=.0191), MELD Score (p< 0001), cold ischemia time (p=.0123), and length of intubation (p< .0001) to be predictors of post-operative development of dysphagia. Pre-transplant dialysis (p<.0001), dysphagia related to end stage liver disease (p<.0001), Karnofsky Performance Status Scale (p<.0001), wait time to transplant (p=0.0173), surgery time (p=0.0095), tracheostomy (p<0.0001), and transfusion of intraoperative RBC (p<.0001), intraoperative platelets (p=0.0018), intraoperative FFP (p=0.0495), perioperative FFP (p=0.0002), perioperative platelets (p=0.0151) and perioperative RBC (p=0.0002) were variables of significance associated with the development of postoperative dysphagia from univariate analysis. Our results propose a set of predictors that should be considered when identifying post-operative critically ill patients at risk for dysphagia.

    Keywords: dysphagia, Liver, transplant, MELD, Liver Transplantation

    Received: 10 Apr 2024; Accepted: 23 Jul 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Isdahl, Katz, Johnson Ms Ccc-Slp, Leverson, Al-Adra and Thibeault. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: David P. Al-Adra, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, United States

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.