Live liver donation from adult to baby via laparoscopy is a first for Spain
Wednesday, May 18, 2016 @ 12:30 PM
THE FIRST-EVER live-donor liver transplant via laparoscopy from an adult to a baby has been carried out in Córdoba's Reina Sofía University Hospital between a nine-month-old girl and her aunt.
Ana Rodríguez, 35, underwent a 'minimally-invasive' procedure to extract a small portion of her liver – one of the only organs, along with a kidney, which can be donated from a living person, given that the liver regrows inside the recipient and a person only needs 10% of the organ to be able to survive.
The donated organ part was immediately transferred to Emma, who is now 11 months old but who, at the time, was suffering from a rare congenital condition which shuts down her bile ducts.
She had undergone an operation to open them up as a temporary measure to keep her stable until the transplant could be performed.
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