Stanford University Liver Transplant ProgramDear Friends: We would like to take this opportunity to update you regarding the adult and pediatric Liver Transplant Program at Stanford Hospital and Cinics and at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford. The medical, nursing and support personnel who were formerly at California Pacific Medical Center moved to Stanford in 1995. The total experience of Dr. Carlos Esquivel and his team at California Pacific Medical Center and Stanford University Medical Center is now over 1200 liver transplantations. We are currently performing pediatric living donor liver transplantation, in which a family member donates the left lateral segment of the liver; split liver transplantation, in which a cadaver donor liver is divided to allow two transplants, with the larger right lobe placed into an adult and the smaller left lobe into a child; and adult-to-adult living donor liver transplantation, in which the right lobe of a donor is resected and transplanted into an adult patient. In the face of the major changes in the delivery of health care, we also have been adopting measures to streamline the transplant process and contain costs without impacting on outcome. The mean length of stay after liver transplantation at Stanford is 16 days for children and 10 days for adults. In addition, we have performed approximately 25% of liver transplants without transfusion of blood - a further savings in costs as well as a reduction in the risks of transfusion. We now have more than 500 patients on our adult and pediatric waiting lists. Our combined surgical and medical inpatient liver service averages 8-12 patients on the adult program and 3-6 patients on the pediatric service. We are quite pleased by the initial eight years of liver transplantation at Stanford and are very appreciative of the support of all of our faculty colleagues as well as the nursing staff, administration and all of the services that are critically important for the care of liver transplant patients. Sincerely,
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