Successful liver transplantation for Rendu-Weber-Osler disease, a single centre experience

BACKROUNDS/PURPOSE: Hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia or Rendu-Weber-Osler is an autosomal dominant inherited disorder characterized by arteriovenous malformations and telangiectasia that may affect the nose, skin, lungs, brain and gastrointestinal tract. Liver involvement of the disease has been described to be responsible of biliary tract necrosis, high cardiac output and portal hypertension, due to intra-hepatic vascular shunts. We aimed to present four cases of successful orthotopic liver transplantations in this indication performing our modified Piggy-back technique.

Between 2002 and 2008, four patients have been diagnosed for Rendu-Weber-Osler disease and underwent liver transplantation. Three of them suffered from high cardiac output with heart failure, two presented HBV infection and one patient suffered from renal failure requiring a liver-kidney transplantation. We performed our modified Piggy-back technique for liver implantation, which consists to clamp selectively the hepatic veins during the hepatectomy, without venous bypass, the retro-hepatic vena cava is preserved.

No hemodynamic concerns disturbed the surgery and no massive transfusions were needed. The liver replacement corrected the cardiac insufficiency due to high cardiac output for the three patients. At present, the four patients are getting well.

Despite new advances in immunotherapy for the medical treatment of Rendu-Weber-Osler disease, liver transplantation remains the curative option for hepatic based-hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia.