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Acetaminophen is a commonly used analgesic and antipyretic drug, which has experienced an increase in its consumption in recent years in our environment. There has also been an increase in the number of accidental and intentional overdoses that were treated by the health system. Its toxicity is dose-dependent and can cause fulminant liver failure, becoming one of the main reasons for liver transplantation in English-speaking countries. The case of a 28-year-old woman with a history of major depression and five previous suicide attempts, who deliberately ingested a significant amount of paracetamol tablets, is here presented. She developed fulminant liver failure and metabolic acidosis, for which she underwent an emergency liver transplant due to the severity of her condition, from which she evolved favorably. The decision to perform a liver transplant in serious cases like this and under a condition of severe psychiatric vulnerability is challenging and must be carefully considered. This particular case illustrates the importance of multidisciplinary care including psychiatric evaluation in patients with acetaminophen poisoning.

Introduction: Acute liver failure (ALF) is a multisystem disease with severe impairment of liver function of acute onset. The Paediatric End-stage Liver Disease (PELD) score is used as a predictor of mortality in chronic liver disease, however experience is limited in ALF., Objectives: To evaluate the aetiology and outcomes of children with ALF in a Children's Liver Transplant Centre, and to investigate the validity of PELD as a prognostic indicator., Patients and Methods: A retrospective study was conducted on patients diagnosed with ALF in our hospital from 2000 to 2013 using the criteria of the Paediatric ALF Study Group., Results: The study included 49 patients with an age range 0-14years. The most frequent aetiologies were: indeterminate (36.7%) and metabolic (26.5%). Liver transplant (LT) was required by 42.8%, and there were 16.3% deaths. Patients with higher levels of bilirubin, INR, or encephalopathy were more likely to require a liver transplant, yielding an OR for INR 1.93. A cut-off of 27 in the PELD score according to the ROC curve showed a sensitivity of 86% and a specificity of 85%, predicting a worse outcome (AUC: 0.90; P<.001). The survival of patients with ALF without transplantation seems more likely in those who have low values of PELD and absence of encephalopathy, with a RR of 0.326., Conclusions: ALF patients with a high PELD score and the presence of encephalopathy had worse outcomes. The PELD score could be a useful tool to establish the optimum time for inclusion in the transplant list, however further studies are still needed., (Copyright © 2017 Asociación Española de Pediatría. Publicado por Elsevier España, S.L.U. All rights reserved.)

Before liver transplantation became widely applicable as a treatment option, the mortality rate for acute liver failure was as high as 85%. Today, acute liver failure is a relatively common transplant indication in some settings, but the results of liver transplantation in this context appear to be worse than those for chronic forms of liver disease. In this review, we discuss the indications and contraindications for urgent liver transplantation. In particular, we consider the roles of auxiliary, ABO-incompatible, and urgent living donor liver transplantation and address the management of a «status 1» patient with total hepatectomy and portocaval shunt for toxic liver syndrome., (Copyright © 2017 AEC. Publicado por Elsevier España, S.L.U. All rights reserved.)

Liver transplantation (LT) is the treatment of choice in selected patients with end-stage liver disease and in some with acute liver failure, hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and other diseases with no synthetic liver failure. Currently, LT has an overall survival > 90 % at 1 year. Proper selection of LT candidates is important given the shortage in organ donation. The allocation and priorization of organs to patients with chronic liver failure (CLF) in waiting lists, is determined by the MELD priority score (Model of End Stage Liver Disease). Indications for LT in patients with CLF are the same regardless of the etiology (any type of hepatic decompensation or development of HCC). Priority MELD is a variant to this classification used only in special cases such as in those with stable hepatopathy but severe extra-hepatic features (e.g., HCC or hepato-pulmonary syndrome). The indication for LT in patients with acute liver failure (ALF) and acute failure associated to chronic liver failure (ACLF) are not fully established; there are prognostic factors that may guide the decision for urgent LT and some centers, like the King's College Hospital criteria in the UK. Currently, LT is a therapeutic modality in some primary liver tumors (HCC, cholangiocarcinoma) and neuroendocrine liver metastatic tumors. These protocols have provided significant opportunities for long-term survival (> 70% at 5 years). The high demand and shortage of organs have fostered the development of new strategies to benefit more patients, such as the use of extended criteria donors, or "domino" transplants. This review focuses on the most relevant data on the different indications of LT.

Introduction: Right hepatic artery (RHA) injury after laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) may go unnoticed clinically, but can sometimes cause necrosis of the right lobe. Exceptionally, when the necrosis spreads to segment IV, fulminant liver failure (FLF) may occur, and an urgent liver transplantation (LT) may be required., Patients and Method: We provide a review of the literature on patients with indication for an LT due to vascular damage caused by bile duct injury following LC. The case reported herein is the fourth described in the specialized literature of LT due to RHA injury after LC and the second of FLF after RHA injury., Results: LT due to RHA injury was performed in 3 of 13 patients reported in the literature: one LT was performed at 3 months due to FLF, after an extended right hepatectomy was performed, and the remaining two were performed due to secondary biliary cirrhosis. Our patient was transplanted due to FLF 15 days after the injury., Conclusions: RHA injury after LC may require LT due to FLF. Although exceptional, this possibility should be considered when there are RHA complications that may require occlusion., (Copyright © 2011 AEC. Published by Elsevier Espana. All rights reserved.)

Liver transplantation is the best therapeutic approach in patients with acute liver failure. This clinical presentation during pregnancy is an unusual and dramatic event. We report the case of a 18 year-old woman with cryptogenic acute liver failure who underwent successful orthotopic liver transplantation at 20 weeks of pregnancy. Both outcomes were analyzed. Fetal death was observed within 48 hours after liver transplant. After six months of follow-up, the patient is doing well. This case illustrates the challenge of treating acute liver failure during pregnancy and demonstrates that liver transplantation is a feasible therapeutic option for treatment of patient with this condition.

We report a 33 year-old female with a diagnosis of halothane-induce fulminant hepatic failure who was subjected to a liver transplant with an ABO-incompatible graft. The patient received a therapeutic protocol that included total plasma exchange, splenectomy and quadruple immunosuppression. After 5 years, the patient remains asymptomatic and with normal liver enzymes, while she has been treated with low dose of immunosuppressive drugs. This case demonstrates an example of how the immunological process of accommodation opens the possibility of using ABO-incompatible organs as a definitive grafts.

Liver transplantation is an excellent therapeutic option for terminal liver disease. During the last decades the results of liver transplantation have improved significantly with a patient survival rate of nearly 90% at one year and 80% at 5 years of follow-up. The main indications for liver transplantation include: end-stage liver disease associated to cirrhosis, acute liver failure, and hepatic tumors (mainly hepatocarcinoma). The absolute contraindications for a transplant are less frequent than in the past, and include: severe co-morbidity (cardiac or pulmonary), sepsis, advanced HIV disease and extra-hepatic malignancy. This document presents a Consensus of the main groups performing liver transplantation in Chile, about its indications and contraindications. It also reviews general aspects of liver transplantation, including the selection and referral of liver transplant candidates, allocation of organs and the evaluation of severity of liver disease.

Liver transplantation is an efficient therapeutic option for terminal hepatic diseases. The principal indications of liver transplantation are hepatic cirrhosis, hepatic tumours (mainly, hepatocellular carcinoma) and acute liver failure. Over the years, the absolute contraindications for a transplant have lessened. Surgical techniques have also undergone changes. The results of liver transplant have improved so that survival one year after the transplant is close to 90% and after five years some 80% of transplanted patients continue to live.

Introduction: Acute hepatic failure (AHF) is an uncommon entity but with high mortality. Liver transplantation has improved prognosis but is an aggressive treatment with high risk. Currently, there are no accurate criteria to differentiate between irreversible AHF and the possibility of hepatic regeneration. The aim of this study is to review the clinical characteristics indicating transplantation and the outcome of AHF in patients at our institution., Patients and Method: Descriptive and retrospective study of cases of AHF at our institution in the last 3 years., Results: Eleven patients were studied. Mortality was lower in transplant recipients (23%; 2 out of 8) than in non-transplanted patients (67%; 2 out 3). Hepatic regeneration occurred in one patient. Overall mortality was 36% with a perioperative mortality of 13%., Conclusion: The indication of hepatic transplantation in patients with a poor prognosis, early stage acute liver failure, and a low grade of encephalopathy, and prior to the development of multiorgan failure could improve the results of transplantation and reduce perioperative mortality.

Acute liver failure (ALF) is a medical emergency which entails a multisistemic affectation almost always. Twenty cases of ALF have been reviewed in a teaching hospital with active liver transplantation programme. A high percentage of patients with alcohol abuse was observed although these patients did not have previously known hepatic damage. Although microbiological, toxicological and anatomopatological studies were performed in all cases, an important difficulty for establishing the etiologic agent was observed. We observed a worse prognosis in those patients older than 40, those with grade IV encephalophaty and those that did not undergo a liver transplantation. Most patients needed UCI attention and more than half died.

Severe liver failure is a rare complication of erythropoietic protoporphyria (PEP), which is associated with a high rate mortality. Until now, 31 patients with this hepatic complication had underwent a liver transplantation, with a high rate of survival, but their long-term outcome is not well established. We report the first case in Spain of PEP in 59-year-old, whose acute liver failure was treated with liver transplantation, without postoperative complications. The patient is in good clinical condition 30 months later. Nevertheless during the first eleven months of follow-up the plasma levels of protoporphyrin remained elevated, which was accompanied of biochemical and histological evidence of relapse of the metabolic disease in the graft. Cases such as this stress the usefulness of liver transplantation, but also the need of more efficient measures to decrease the protoporphyrin levels before and after the transplant, in order to prevent hepatic and extrahepatic complications in these patients.