What are Types of Liver Transplant Procedures?

All the process of liver transplantation requires that the donor does/did not have cancer or any other illness that could be transmitted to the recipient’s body during or after transplantation. Following are the three types of liver transplantation procedures:

Orthotopic treatment

In this procedure, the complete liver of a deceased donor, who was declared brain dead and died recently, is transplanted in the recipient’s body. It is obvious that the deceased donor must have donated his or her organs for donation before death.

Split type liver transplant

This procedure simultaneously benefits two patients who require liver transplantation. The healthy liver is taken from a deceased donor’s body and is split into two halves, left and right lobes. The larger lobe or the right lobe is transplanted in an adult’s body, while the left lobe is transplanted into a child’s body. Over the time, the transplanted liver grows back to its normal size through regeneration.

Living donor transplant

This type of liver transplant involves retrieving a part of healthy liver from a living person’s body and then transplanting it into the recipient’s body. Usually, the right lobe is better suited for adults, while the left lobe is apt for children. The donor’s remaining liver keeps functioning normally after the surgery and regenerates to its original size in about 45 days.