Value of liver stiffness measured by transient elastography in the liver transplant pre-operative evaluation of the potential deceased liver donors: preliminary study.

ABSTRACT

The selection of a liver graft is crucial for the success of a transplantation. One of the determinant factors in the selection of a liver graft of quality is to assess the degree of steatosis. The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of a FibroScan(®) during the liver retrieval procedure and to determine the interest of measuring liver stiffness (LS) using the FibroScan(®) as a criterion of objective assessment in the pre-donation selection of liver grafts. Of 16 FibroScan(®) performed on 16 livers of donors meeting conventional French criteria for the selection of liver grafts, the LS values were considered as abnormal in three donors (18.75%). The correspondence with the histologic analysis of the biopsies in terms of elevated steatosis was excellent. For 13 other liver grafts, the values of LS were normal as were the histologic analyses of the biopsies. A supplementary multicenter study is required in order to position the transient elastography as the objective examination in the pre-operative selection of liver grafts.