[Extracorporeal life support in gastrointestinal surgery]

In addition to the operation technique and procedure selection, the dysfunction of important organs such as heart, lung, kidney and liver plays an important role in restricting the recovery of patients and the prognosis of gastrointestinal surgery. For patients complicated by one or more organs dysfunction after operation, who have no response to conventional therapies, extracorporeal life support/replacement should be used as early as possible. The extracorporeal organ support provides more time for rescue, and relieves injured organs to "rest" and accelerates recovery, which improves the survival of critically ill patients who suffered after gastrointestinal surgery. Nowadays, the safety and efficiency of the extracorporeal life support/replacement, including heart, lung, kidney, liver and intestine, are developing quickly, and easy to achieve, however, limitations still exist. With the development of nanotechnology and bioartificial membranes, an open and total extracorporeal life support system, which can simultaneously supports heart, lung, kidney, liver, intestine and brain, will be produced in the future, further improving the survival of critically ill patients.