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Medical AI Inquiry: You was designed to assist in medical decision-making based on the provided user questions. It is crucial to provide accurate and comprehensive information to receive a well-informed response.  Labels: BACKGROUND, METHODS, RESULTS. Meshes: Adult, Antiviral Agents, Combined Modality Therapy, Drug Administration Schedule, Drug Therapy, Combination, Female, Follow-Up Studies, Hepatitis C, Chronic, Humans, Hypersplenism, Interferon alpha-2, Interferon-alpha, Liver Cirrhosis, Liver Transplantation, Male, Middle Aged, Polyethylene Glycols, Recombinant Proteins, Retrospective Studies, Ribavirin, Splenectomy, Treatment Outcome.
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Does simultaneous splenectomy during liver transplantation augment anti-viral therapy in patients infected with hepatitis C virus? Context: Simultaneous splenectomy in liver transplantation (LT) is selectively indicated because of splenoportal venous thromboses and increased sepsis. Therefore, its impact should be further investigated. Of the 160 liver transplant patients, only 40 underwent simultaneous splenectomy. Clinicopathologic characteristics and outcomes were compared between the splenectomy and non-splenectomy group using retrospective analysis. Although the groups were similar and had no significant difference in the intra- and postoperative data, non-splenectomy group had more male patients. However, splenectomy group showed significantly higher platelet and leukocyte counts at 1 month and 6 months after the transplantation and higher hepatitis C virus anti-viral therapy completion. Furthermore, 3 patients developed portal or splenic vein thrombosis during the postoperative follow-up, but the overall survival rate did not significantly differ between these groups.
assistant
Simultaneous splenectomy in LT can be safely performed, particularly in patients with hepatitis C virus cirrhosis, small-for-size grafts, hypersplenism, and ABO blood group incompatible (ABO - incompatible) LT. Final Decision: yes