Chronicle of a need

Chronicle of a need Hepatic extracorporeal support, which means, putting a liver outside the patient’s body for helping support the damaged hepatic function, started to be rehearsed during the 70’s. For many years it was abandoned to research because the necessary technology for keeping the organ alive outside the body wasn’t available.

In the 90’s, various groups started to develop a new concept of extracorporeal support, not only hepatic, with the goal of also sustaining the cardio-respiratory function in patients during surgery. The new Argentinean development is the concept of immune-isolation of the liver through a special membrane.

The bio-artificial liver is a development that is currently being carried out in the Hospital Italiano of Buenos Aires, destined for patients with terminal hepatitis, specially children. There were many stages since 1993 when Dr. Pablo Argibay (*) became part of the project until today, when this development is available, specially for children below 22 lbs. Research and experimentation were motivated by the serious problem in Argentina, the same as in other underdeveloped countries, of terminal hepatitis in children. Up to this moment, there wasn’t anywhere in the world a device that could sustain life and quality until the moment of transplant in children with terminal hepatitis.

Collaborated in this article: Dr. Pablo Argibay

The bio-artificial liver • Part I: patients with terminal hepatitis achieve transplants.

Stressful events activate biochemical mechanisms that diminish the organ’s immune response.