NIHR Alert 2 October 2020
- Researchers have studied a technique called Normothermic Machine Perfusion (NMP) which keeps blood flowing through the liver while it is outside the body. The liver is preserved in a near real-life condition while it is assessed for transplant.
- The new trial, called VITTAL, showed that many livers which had been rejected by surgeons could be transplanted successfully into patients. This is a step forward in making more livers available for transplantation.
- The full paper: Mirza DF, and others. Transplantation of discarded livers following viability testing with normothermic machine perfusion. Nature Communications, 2020;11:2939
