To investigate the safety and clinical efficacy of liver resection specimens with hemangioma as donor liver in liver transplantation (LT).

Clinical data of 2 donors and 2 recipients who underwent LT using the left liver resection specimens with hemangioma as donor liver in the Frist Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University between November 2012 and October 2015 were retrospectively analyzed. Among the donors, 1 case was a 41-year-old male and the other was a 50-year-old female. They were both adult and diagnosed with cavernous hemangioma in the left lobe. Among the recipients, 1 case was a 27-year-old male and diagnosed with hepatocellular carcinoma and liver cirrhosis after hepatitis B, and the other case was a 7-month-old boy and diagnosed with biliary liver cirrhosis and congenital biliary atresia. The informed consents of all donors and recipients or their relatives were obtained and the local ethical committee approval was received. The donor livers including 1 case without hemangioma resection and the other case with hemangioma resection, were both obtained from the left lobe and used for the modified piggyback LT. The postoperative recovery of the patients and the proliferation of the transplanted liver were observed.

LT was successfully performed. Two donors recovered well after surgery with fast residual liver proliferation and were both discharged. Two recipients recovered well after surgery and no complications including primary liver graft non-function, small-for-size syndrome or rejection response were observed. CT scan of 1 recipient at 11 d, 3 and 6 months after surgery indicated that the transplanted liver volume enlarged rapidly while no significant change was observed in the hemangioma volume. And CT scan of the recipient at 13, 23 and 29 months after surgery indicated that significant reduction was observed in the hemangioma volume while no obvious enlargement was observed in the liver volume.

It is safe to use the liver resection specimens with hemangioma as donor liver for LT. It can relieve the shortage of donor liver to a certain degree.