title: Immunomodulating therapy in liver transplantation: principles and practice.
abstract: Liver transplantation has enjoyed dramatic success as a treatment option for patients suffering from chronic end-stage liver diseases. It also serves as a definitive treatment for certain genetic conditions such as familial amyloidosis and primary oxalosis, and as a potential curative therapy in selected cases of primary liver cancer. Currently, over 50,000 patients are alive with functioning liver transplants. Liver transplantation owes its success to advances in surgical technique, improvements in anesthesia and critical care, and advances in treatment of post-transplant complications including improved therapies for cytomegalovirus infections. But perhaps the most important advances in liver transplantation arise in the context of improvements in our understanding of the molecular biology of transplant immunology and the development of new agents that allow for manipulation of immunological signaling pathways. These improvements in immunosuppressive therapy have dramatically increased both graft and patient survival.
authors.affiliation: Division of Critical Care Medicine, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN 55905, USA.
authors.forename: Jody C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Olson
authors.forename: Russell H
authors.initials: RH
authors.lastname: Wiesner
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D006084:Graft Rejection / Q000209:etiology / Q000517:prevention & control*; D006085:Graft Survival / Q000187:drug effects; D006801:Humans; D056747:Immunomodulation; D007166:Immunosuppressive Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D008107:Liver Diseases / Q000628:therapy*; D016031:Liver Transplantation; D015398:Signal Transduction / Q000187:drug effects / Q000276:immunology; D014181:Transplantation Immunology
chemical_list: D007166:Immunosuppressive Agents