Fostering liver living donor liver transplantation

The review discusses issues pertinent to fostering professional and public interest in living donor liver transplantation. We discuss practices that we have adopted at our center, issues that have arisen and provide suggestions to expand live donor transplantation.

To bridge the gap between the current supply and demand of deceased donor organs, the transplant program in Toronto established the busiest live donor liver transplant program in the western world. To date, we have performed 664 live liver donor procedures with no donor deaths and excellent recipient and donor outcomes. To foster and grow live donation, we established a strong culture supporting live donation; hired a full-time, dedicated team of individuals to support the live donor program; obtained financial support for donors through a partnership agreement with the Trillium Gift of Life Network; developed linkages with the media, community service groups and the general public; generated patient education materials; and established a website.

With the present and future trends of deceased donation worldwide, we anticipate that live liver donation will remain an important option to fully meet the needs of patients requiring liver transplantation for the foreseeable future.