[Donors yesterday and today: have the characteristics of liver donors changed over the last 15 years?].
BACKGROUND
The social, medical and demographic changes of our population and the increase in the number of patients on waiting lists have led to some changes in the selection criteria of organ donors.


METHODS
A retrospective, descriptive and comparative study of the liver cadaveric donors features accepted in the Liver Transplant Unit in La Fe University Hospital of Valencia (Spain) in 2 different periods. We distributed the cases into 2 groups, including in group A the first 200 first donors (from January 1991 to June 1995) and in group B the last 200 donors (from February 2004 to December 2005).


RESULTS
The number of donors increased from 18 during 1991 to 106 in 2006. In group A the mean age was 32.4 years, compared to 52.3 years in group B. In group A, the main cause of death was craneoencephalic traumatism and in group B cerebrovascular accidents. The mean time in the intensive care unit was longer in the second group with 67.2 hours. In group B, considerable atherosclerosis was reported in 17% of cadaveric donors and macroscopic liver steatosis in 29.5%, compared to 5 and 12%, respectively, in group A.


CONCLUSIONS
Nowadays, cadaveric liver donors are older, suffer more chronic diseases, die due to cerbrovascular diseases, remain longer in intensive care units and the livers are macroscopically worse compared to donors accepted 15 years ago.
Bruna Esteban
Marcos
M
Servicio de Cirugía General y Aparato Digestivo, Consorcio Hospital General Universitario, Valencia, España.
López Andújar
Rafael
R
Montalvá Orón
Eva
E
Redondo Cano
Carlos
C
Moya Herraiz
Angel
A
San Juan Rodríguez
Fernando
F
Pareja Ibars
Eugenia
E
Vila Carbó
Juan José
JJ
Burgueño
Manuel de Juan
Mde J
Mir Pallardó
José
J
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D016031:Liver Transplantation / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D013030:Spain; D013997:Time Factors; D014019:Tissue Donors / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*