Liver Transplants Are Better All Around When You Hold the Ice

April 18, 2018

(Los Angeles Times) – To preserve more livers for transplant patients who desperately need them, surgeons should take newly harvested organs out of their ice baths and immerse them instead in a warm, nutrient-rich soup, new research suggests. In a head-to-head comparison of the two methods, preserving donor livers in conditions that mimic a living body resulted in 20% more organs being transplanted into patients, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal Nature.