The results of this study appear in the March 2005 issue of Liver Transplantation, the official journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD) and the International Liver Transplantation Society (ILTS). The journal is published on behalf of the societies by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and is available online via Wiley InterScience at http://www.interscience.wiley.com/journal/livertransplantation.

Since 2002, liver allocation in the U.S. has been based on a patient's score on the Model for End-Stage Liver Disease (MELD), which uses levels of three biochemical markers (serum bilirubin, serum creatinine, and prothrombin time expressed as INR) to predict three-month mortality in patients with cirrhosis of the liver listed for transplantation. The current study examined whether factoring serum sodium and hyponatremia (low sodium level in the blood), as additional markers would increase the accuracy of the MELD score to predict risk of death on the waiting list.

Led by Andres E. Ruf, M.D., of the Liver Unit of the Fundacion Favaloro in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the study included 262 patients with cirrhosis who were listed for liver transplantation at Fundacion Favaloro between June 1995 and January 2003. INR, serum bilirubin, creatinine and sodium were measured at the time of listing and used to calculate a MELD score. The efficacy of serum sodium, hyponatremia (defined by serum sodium less than or equal to 130 mEq/L) and MELD to predict death within 3 and 6 months of listing was analyzed with two different statistical methods. Results of the study showed that when added to the MELD, serum sodium and hyponatremia sign
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Contact: David Greenberg
dgreenbe@wiley.com
201-748-6484
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
18-Feb-2005