Opioid-induced hyperalgesia and rapid opioid detoxification after tacrolimus administration.

Opioids can induce central sensitization and hyperalgesia, referred to as "opioid-induced hyperalgesia." Our report describes a patient who underwent intestinal transplant followed by immunosuppressant-related neuropathic pain. Her pain was treated with limited success over the course of 3 yr with different therapies, including i.v. morphine. She developed opioid-induced hyperalgesia, which was successfully treated with rapid detoxification under general anesthesia. Detoxification improved her quality of life, including the ability to resume physiotherapy. Six months after treatment, she remained opioid free. Our experience suggests that rapid detoxification under general anesthesia may be an effective treatment for opioid-induced hyperalgesia and merits comparison to traditional detoxification methods.

Liver transplantation from donors aged 80 years and over: pushing the limit.

Older donors are a growing part of the total donor pool but no definite consensus exists on the limit of age for their acceptance. From November 1998 to January 2003, in a retrospective case-control multicenter study, we compared the outcome of 30 orthotopic liver transplantations (OLTs) with octogenarian donors and of 60 chronologically correlated OLTs performed with donors <40 years. The percentage of refusal was greater among older than younger donors (48.2 vs. 14.3%; p < 0.001). Cold ischemia was significantly shorter in the older than younger groups. Recipients with hepatocarcinoma and older age received octogenarian grafts more frequently. No differences were seen in post-operative complications and 6-month graft and patient survival. However, long-term survival was lower in patients transplanted with octogenarian donors (p = 0.04). Interestingly, the mortality related to hepatitis C recurrence was greater in patients with octogenarian donors. Accordingly, the long-term survival of HCV-positive patients who received older grafts was lower than those receiving younger grafts (p = 0.05). Octogenarian livers can be used safely but a careful donor evaluation and a short cold ischemia are required to prevent additional risk factors. However, hepatitis C recurrence is associated with a greater mortality in patients who received octogenarian grafts raising concerns whether to allocate these livers to HCV-positive recipients.

First report of cryopreserved human hepatocytes based bioartificial liver successfully used as a bridge to liver transplantation.

Cryopreserved human hepatocytes could be the best type of cells to be used in a bioartificial liver (BAL) device due to reduced biosafety and biocompatibility risks. Banking of primary human hepatocytes, obtained from livers unwanted for transplantation at harvesting, could be used as a source of human liver cells for BAL treatment. We describe herein for the first time the case of a patient affected by fulminant hepatic failure (FHF) due to acute HBV infection that was successfully bridged to emergency liver transplantation by BAL treatment using cryopreserved primary human hepatocytes. The use of cryopreserved primary human hepatocytes as the biological part of the BAL device has never been described before and might be considered as a possible alternative to xenogenic material or human tumoral cell lines due to reduced biosafety and biocompatibility risks.