FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 2, 1998
Contact: Sarah Ellis, (303) 315-5571
Woman Gives Husband Early Holiday Gift -- A New Liver
In a pioneering surgery performed yesterday by University Hospital's transplant team, a 45-year-old woman donated most of her liver to her husband. The surgery is the region's first case of living non-related liver transplantation. Both patients are doing well. Patricia Mitchell and her husband, who was suffering from chronic liver disease, came to University Hospital from their home in Las Vegas seeking the surgery. Paul Gerber, 56, had been on the transplant list for more than two months, and likely would have died waiting for an organ from a deceased donor, said Igal Kam, MD, chief of transplant surgery at University Hospital. "Knowing of the success of our living-related liver transplant program, this couple came to University looking for options," Dr Kam said. "She was very determined to give her husband a second chance at life." The University transplant team to date has performed five adult live-donor liver transplants. The first four were living-related, such as brother to sister.
Living-related liver transplants, and now liver transplants between those who are not genetically related, offer patients an alternative to a prolonged wait for donated organs. The surgery also increases the number of livers available for other patients who might otherwise die while waiting to receive an organ. Dr. Kam and Michael Wachs, MD, transplant surgeons, and Greg Everson, MD, and Tom Trouillot, MD, transplant hepatologists, collaborated with the rest of the transplant team on this procedure. University Hospital is the Rocky Mountain region's only academic tertiary care and referral center. Located in Denver, Colo., the hospital is part of the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center campus, one of four campuses in the University of Colorado system.
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