Clinics in liver disease
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Successful liver transplantation in a child is often a hard-won victory, requiring all the combined expertise of a dedicated pediatric transplant team. This article outlines the considerable challenges still facing pediatric liver transplant physicians and surgeons. In looking to the future, where should priorities lie to enhance the success already achieved? First, solutions to the donor shortage must be sought aggressively by increasing the use of from split-liver transplants, judicious application of living-donor programs, and increasing the donation rate, perhaps by innovative means. ⋯ In the United States and in other countries with the medical infrastructure to support liver transplantation, however, health care professionals must strive to be sure that the policies governing candidacy for transplantation and allocation of organs are applied justly and uniformly to all children whose lives are threatened by liver disease. In the current regulatory climate that increasingly takes medical decisions out of the hands of physicians, pediatricians must be even more prepared to protect the unique and often complicated needs of children both before and after transplantation. Only in this way can the challenges of the present and the future be met.