How successful is the medical procedure of a liver transplant?
There are two kinds of liver transplants: The most common comes from non-living donors who have died from fatal brain injury. The most controversial is living donor liver transplantation where a portion of a living person’s liver is removed and used to replace the entire liver of the recipient. This was first performed in 1989 for pediatric liver transplantation. Only 20 percent of an adult’s liver is needed for an infant or small child. More recently, adult-to-adult liver transplantation has been done using the donor’s right hepatic lobe which amounts to 60 percent of the liver. Because of the ability of the liver to regenerate, both the donor and recipient end up with normal liver function if all goes well.
