Ex Vivo Liver Machine Perfusion

Organ shortage and the increasing gap between the number of available donors and wait list patients has urged transplant centers to extend the criteria of organ acceptance to increase the donor pool. Although this practice has led to increased transplant dynamics, it may pose the recipients to an increased risk of primary non-function, early allograft dysfunction, or postoperative complications. The ex vivo liver machine perfusion has recently emerged as a promising novel strategy to not only decrease the ischemia time, but also serve as a tool to predict the post-transplant viability of donor livers, and thus decreasing the graft discard rate, while ruling out the “futile” liver transplants.

This Research Topic will serve as a podium to present the remarkable ongoing research and evolving clinical trials on ex vivo liver machine perfusion, which should aim to define the best set-up or the best combination of different set-ups of this novel technology to safely increase the donor pool and improve the post-transplant outcomes, as well as to address the technical challenges faced through the application of different types of this technology, preferably in different donor and recipients scenarios. We also aim to present the current body of evidence on biomarker research used for viability testing. Furthermore, the addition of organ protective strategies and stem cell research to machine perfusion to maximize the advantages towards better outcomes is another exciting field of focus.

The scope of this specific collection includes clinical trials, case-series, narrative reviews, systematic reviews, meta-analyses, case reports as well as experimental animal research and involves all research aspects of ex vivo machine perfusion technology, including but not limited to, the hypothermic, subnormothermic and normothermic machine perfusion as well as controlled oxygenated rewarming. Authors are also welcome to upload interesting research videos.