Various Risk Factors Associated With Liver Transplant

By Author: PSRI Hospital
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Liver is undeniably one of the most essential and purposeful organs in the human body. It not only filters the blood to remove compounds and chemical toxins from the body but also plays a major role in food digestion and production of crucial amino acids. It also helps in the production of bile juices, which in turn help with the digestion & absorption of fat and other essential vitamins in our bodies.

Need for Liver Transplantation Surgery

Although liver is a highly efficient body organ with impressive regenerative abilities, it can still face complete functional failure sometimes. Moderate deterioration or a substantial tissue infection can lead to a state of organ failure, which may even amplify to a state of patient’s death. However, with wide-spread advancement in the medical field the number of deaths related to liver failure have considerably dropped, thus allowing patients to comfortably heal and re-migrate to their normal life pretty soon.

There are two distinctive medical conditions in which liver transplant becomes imperative.

Chronic Liver Failure: As the name suggests, ...
... chronic liver failure often takes place gradually over the course of time to a state where natural healing becomes completely ineffective. Prolonged disease or excessive alcohol intake can typically scar the liver enduringly, after which liver transplant surgery stands as the only chance to survive. In a state of chronic liver failure, patients often face liver cirrhosis to a point where natural recovery becomes nearly impossible.

Acute Liver Failure: Unlike chronic failure, acute liver condition often occurs suddenly without the patient even realizing his actual medical state. It happens unexpectedly, often building up due to a viral infection, toxin or a distinctive injury. Some other causes of liver failure include conditions like liver cirrhosis, alcoholic liver disease, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, hemochromatosis, primary sclerosing cholangitis, Wilson’s disease or cystic fibrosis, etc.

Although at the end stage of liver failure, going for an organ transplant surgery comes across as the only viable option for patients, there might also be a long list of risks and complications that come attached. Here are few risk factors associated with liver transplantation along with its various after effects.

Bile duct complications: It is one of the most common medical risk that comes attached with a liver transplant surgery. After taking up organ transplant, a majority of the patients complain about bile duct leaks or shrinking of the bile ducts followed by sudden bleeding and blood clots.

Failure of donated liver is one of the biggest risks associated with liver transplant surgery. Despite countless medical tests and heavy medication after surgical procedure, there still remain few chances of liver failure among patients.

Other factors like induced infection and liver rejection also present a serious threat against surgical success.

Factors affecting the cost of liver transplant in India

Liver transplant is essentially one of the costliest medical treatments around the western states of the world. However, the cost of liver transplant in India is considerably lower than most countries around the globe, thanks to the availability of advanced apparatus and an army of skilled surgeons.
While there are lot many considerations that command your final invoice, crucial factors such as the quality of treatment, surgery, and post-operation healthcare can also affect your final medical bill. Other key factors affecting the cost of liver transplant include the surgeon’s fee, total helping staff, ICU charge, post-surgical consultation, along with the added cost of medications and other prescriptions.

Conclusion

Although India is still placed under the “developing nations” tag, its noticeable advancement in the technical and medical field has always caused an uproar among the developed nations like the US and UK. While the total cost of liver transplant in the US can anywhere cost around 2-2.15 crores INR, patients can put up with an equally efficient transplant process for as low as 30-40 lakhs INR in India.