Cellular therapy renders damaged donor livers suitable for transplantation
The demand for liver transplants outnumbers the supply of healthy donor livers available. Bile duct damage affects 20-30% of transplanted livers and is the reason many donated livers are rejected.
Cambridge researchers have developed a technique to repair bile ducts in livers deemed unsuitable for transplantation.
Healthy bile duct cells were obtained from liver biopsies in healthy people and grown in the laboratory to the billions required to regenerate the ducts in the liver.
Damaged donor livers could be kept alive outside the body while healthy new bile duct cells were injected and the bile ducts repaired.
This has the potential to dramatically increase the number of organs suitable for transplantation, while also highlighting the potential of cell therapy to repair damaged bile ducts (accounting for 70% of transplants in children, 30% in adults), preventing the need for transplantation altogether.