[Auxiliary partial orthotopic liver transplantation in rats]

A rat model of auxiliary partial orthotopic liver transplantation (APOLT) was developed in this study. Under hemihepatic inflow and outflow occlusions, the recipient underwent 75% partial hepatectomy before the liver graft comprising 30% of the donor liver was implanted on the orthotopic site. Forty rat APOLT were successfully performed. The 5-day survival rate of the recipient was 87.5% and that of the graft was 75%. On the fifth postoperative day, the living graft weight increased by 100%, the liver cell showed an active proliferation with a diploid of deoxyribonuclease (DNA), and the liver cells in DNA-synthetic phase accounted for 22.6 +/- 2.75%, significantly exceeding 12.22% +/- 1.48% of the normal rat hepatocytes (P < 0.001). It may be concluded that the rat APOLT is a more ideal animal model.