Liver transplantation in Jehovah's Witnesses: two cases report / 대한마취과학회지

Liver transplantation is especially challenging in patients who are Jehovah's Witnesses because their religious beliefs prohibit the receipt of blood products. We present two cases of living donor liver transplantation performed in adult Jehovah's Witnesses in South Korea without the use of blood products. In the first case, preoperative erythropoiesisstimulation therapy increased hemoglobin levels from 8.1 to 13.1 g/dl after 9 weeks. In the second case, hemoglobin levels increased from 7.4 to 10.8 g/dl after 6 months of erythropoiesis-stimulation therapy. With the combination of acute normovolemic hemodilution, intraoperative cell salvage, and use of transfusion alternatives, liver transplantation was successfully performed without transfusion of blood products.

Reduction of Apnea Test Time in an Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation-Dependent Potential Donor / 대한이식학회지

The diagnosis of brain death is essential for deceased donor organ transplantation. Currently, extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) is used to increase the chance of survival of patients with severe cardiac and respiratory failure. Therefore, cases of ECMO-dependent potential donors are increasing. The apnea test (AT) is a mandatory component in the clinical determination of brain death. However, conventional AT is not easily applicable to ECMO-dependent potential donors because both the ventilator and ECMO play an important role in carbon dioxide elimination. Accordingly, different methods of AT from those used in routine procedures must be considered. We report here a case of conventional AT with time delay and two cases of AT within 3 minutes by adjusting sweep gas flow rate of ECMO in ECMO-dependent potential donors.