Unfair Advantages for Hepatocellular Carcinoma Patients Listed for Liver Transplant in Short-Wait Regions Following 2015 Hepatocellular Carcinoma Policy Change.

ABSTRACT: For patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) listed for liver transplantation (LT), United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) enacted policy changes in 2015 to improve equity between HCC and non-HCC patients. We evaluated the impact of these changes on regional disparities in wait-list dropout and LT. We included patients in the UNOS database listed with Model for End-Stage Liver Disease HCC exceptions in long-wait regions (LWRs), mid-wait regions (MWRs), and short-wait regions (SWRs) before these policy changes (era 1, January 1 to December 31, 2013) and after (era 2, October 7, 2015, to October 7, 2016). Cumulative incidence of wait-list dropout and LT were evaluated using competing risk regression. Median time to LT increased by 3.6 months (3.1 to 6.7 months) in SWRs and 1.3 months (6

SUBMITTER: Brondfield MN 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8751234 | biostudies-literature | 2020 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature