Prevalence and impact on post-transplant outcome of sarcopenia among patients with cirrhosis on waiting-list for liver transplantation: Preliminary data from an Italian single center experience

Abstract

Background: Sarcopenia, defined as the progressive and generalized loss of skeletal muscle mass, has been reported in 22-45% of waiting-list cirrhotic patients, with one-year post-liver transplantation (LT) survival rates of 50%-64% in sarcopenics vs 85%-94% in non-sarcopenics. However, its role in organ allocation has never been considered, to reduce the underestimation of MELD in liver disease severity in some categories of patients, as women or elders.