Crucial Issues of Hepatic Artery Reconstruction in Living Donor Liver Transplantation: Our Experience with 133 Cases at Dar El-Fouad Hospital, Egypt

Hepatic artery (HA) reconstruction is a crucial step in living donor liver transplantation (LDLT). However, many important aspects specific to this challenging step are still inadequately documented. From August 2001 through March 2007, we performed a total of 133 cases of LDLT at Dar El-Fouad Hospital. The magnifying loupe was used for performing microanastomoses in the first 31 cases, and the operating microscope was used for 98 cases. There were 128 adult and five pediatric patients. One hundred twenty-five patients received right lobe grafts, and seven patients received left lobe grafts. One patient died intraoperatively and was excluded from analysis. Arterial complications occurred in four patients of the first group (4/30, 13%) in the form of early thrombosis. One patient underwent successful interventional thromboembolectomy, two patients underwent surgical reexploration with revision of anastomoses; these three patients survived. The fourth patient died from fulminant liver failure. Regarding the second group, all arterial anastomoses were patent after reconstruction. Signal problems occurred in the form of intraoperative intermittent flow and postoperative no diastole phenomenon. Our overall arterial complication rate was 4.5%; however, we lost only one patient due to HA thrombosis (0.8%). Microsurgical reconstruction of the HA carries its own challenges. The use of operating microscope reduces the risk of complications, and aggressive interference including salvage surgery maximizes the success of HA reconstruction.