En bloc combined liver and small-bowel transplantation in rats: construction of a cuff in portal vein

Abstract

Objective To establish a model of en bloc combined liver/small bowel transplanta-tion in the rat. Methods Homoplastic transplantation of en bloc combined liver and small-bowel in Wistar rats was performed. As for the donor operation, the portal vein and superior mesenteric artery were flushed with 4℃ cold Ringer's solution. The small intestinal lumen was flushed with 4℃ cold Ne-omycin solution. The donor small bowel and liver were harvested, preserved and transplanted as a whole. The donor inferior vena eava in abdomen was cut to construct a muff in the lateral wall of por-tal vein and cuff was placed. For the recipient operation, the orthotopie liver transplantation was com-pleted at first by using Kamada's two cuff technique, and then the donor abdominal aorta was anasto-mosed end to side to the receptor abdominal aorta artery to set up superior mesenteric artery and prop-er hepatic artery blood flow under a microscope. The lower ileum was exteriorized as stoma in right lower abdomen. Results The successful rate of operation was 86 %. The mean survival time of the grafted rats was over 30 d. The transplanted liver and small bowel were normal in histology. Conclu-sion It is feasible to establish a model of en bloc combined liver and small bowel transplantation by constructing a cuff in portal vein. Key words: Liver transplantation; Liver; Small bowel; Rat