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Liver transplant is considered the best treatment for liver cancer, but only available for patients with early-stage disease. Now a study led by Cedars-Sinai Cancer investigators has concluded that immunotherapy could make liver transplant an option for patients with later-stage cancer as well.
Doctors in Seattle are reporting a history-making case in which a patient received two donor organs, a liver and a heart, to prevent the extreme likelihood that her body would reject a donor heart transplanted alone. In this innovative case, the organ recipient’s own healthy liver was transplanted, domino-like, into a second patient who had advanced liver disease.
• After kidney transplantation, natural killer cells of the recipient become active because they miss “self” proteins on donor cells.
• These cells contribute to organ rejection, in addition to traditional modes of rejection involving T cells and antibodies.
By studying the roles of an inflammatory protein and antibodies in chronic rejection after lung transplantation, researchers discover possibilities for new treatments.
For patients who receive a heart transplant in the near future, the old adage, “Good things come in small packages,” may become words to live by. In a recent study, researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine and the National Cancer Institute (NCI) demonstrated in mice that they can easily deliver a promising anti-rejection drug directly to the area surrounding a grafted heart by packaging it within a tiny three-dimensional, protein gel cocoon known as a hydrogel. Best of all, the researchers say that the release of the drug is spread out over time, making it highly regulatable and eliminating the need for daily medication to keep rejection in check.
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