Agrafiotis AC, Karakasi KE, Poras M, Neiros S, Vasileiadou S, Katsanos G. Surgical chest complications after liver transplantation. World J Transplant 2022; 12(11): 359-364 [PMID: 36437843 DOI: 10.5500/wjt.v12.i11.359]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Konstantina-Eleni Karakasi, MD, Surgeon, Department of Transplantation, Medical School, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Hippokration General Hospital, Konstantinoupoleos 49, Thessaloniki 54642, Greece. kelenikarakasi@gmail.com
Research Domain of This Article
Transplantation
Article-Type of This Article
Minireviews
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Apostolos C Agrafiotis, Department of Thoracic Surgery, Saint-Pierre University Hospital, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Bruxelles 1000, Belgium
Konstantina-Eleni Karakasi, Stavros Neiros, Stella Vasileiadou, Georgios Katsanos, Department of Transplantation, Medical School, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Hippokration General Hospital, Thessaloniki 54642, Greece
Mathilde Poras, Department of Abdominal Surgery, Saint-Pierre University Hospital, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Bruxelles 1000, Belgium
Author contributions: Agrafiotis AC, Poras M and Katsanos G were involved in the conception and design; Karakasi KE and Neiros S were administrative support; Poras M, Karakasi KE and Neiros S contributed to the provision of the study material; Poras M, Karakasi KE and Neiros S were involved in the collection and assembly of data; Agrafiotis AC, Vasileiadou S and Katsanos G were involved in the data analysis and interpretation; and all authors wrote the manuscript and approved the final manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report having no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Konstantina-Eleni Karakasi, MD, Surgeon, Department of Transplantation, Medical School, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Hippokration General Hospital, Konstantinoupoleos 49, Thessaloniki 54642, Greece. kelenikarakasi@gmail.com
Received: July 1, 2022 Peer-review started: July 7, 2022 First decision: August 22, 2022 Revised: September 17, 2022 Accepted: October 14, 2022 Article in press: October 14, 2022 Published online: November 18, 2022
Abstract
Liver transplantation is a major abdominal operation and the intimate anatomic relation of the liver with the right hemidiaphragm predisposes the patient to various manifestations in the chest cavity. Furthermore, chronic liver disease affects pulmonary function before and after liver transplantation resulting in a considerable percentage of patients presenting with morbidity related to chest complications. This review aims to identify the potential chest complications of surgical interest during or after liver transplantation. Complications of surgical interest are defined as those conditions that necessitate an invasive procedure (such as thoracocentesis or a chest tube placement) in the chest or a surgical intervention performed by a thoracic surgeon. These complications will be classified as perioperative and postoperative; the latter will be categorized as early and late. Although thoracocentesis or a chest tube placement is usually sufficient when invasive measures are deemed necessary, in some patients, thoracic surgical interventions are warranted. A high index of suspicion is needed to recognize and treat these conditions promptly. A close collaboration between abdominal surgeons, intensive care unit physicians and thoracic surgeons is of paramount importance.
Core Tip: Chest complications during and after liver transplantation significantly affects the surgical and hospitalization outcomes. This minireview focuses on surgical chest complications for transplant patients and categorizes them by time of appearance. This paper may be a helpful guide and tool for medical students, members of the transplantation team and all the collaborative specialties to recognize early chest complications and plan the appropriate treatment.
