November 10, 2015, Qiang Xia, vice president of Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine Affiliated Renji Hospital and director of department of liver surgery, announced the successful implementation of the 500th case of pediatric living donor liver transplantation in our hospital. Department of liver surgery in our hospital has completed one-third of the total number of national pediatric liver transplantations since the first case of pediatric liver transplantation surgery in October 2006. The successful rate of surgeries is more than 95 %, with 1-year and 5-year postoperative survival rate of the children at 93.1 % and 80 % respectively, ranking first in China, which are more than 10% higher than the national average levels. Renji Hospital has thus become the hospital which has completed the maximum number of pediatric liver transplantations among the world in the past five years. At the same time, liver transplantation technology of Renji Hospital has been leading the country in recent years, with a total of 2227 liver transplantation surgeries up to now. Since 2011 the number of liver transplantations at single center has been ranking first for five consecutive years all over the country. The 500 cases of successful pediatric living donor liver transplantations not only record the rebirth of all "New Liver Babies" and their families, but also present the love and devotion for these children’s families from all sections of society.

The 500th liver transplantation patient is Ranran, a 10-month-old girl from Chongqing. She was diagnosed with congenital biliary atresia from birth. Although Kasai surgery had been done at local hospital, her jaundice still persisted and her growth was lagged. After being pulled into the wechat group of liver transplantation patients by wardmates, Ranran’s parents found that many children like her had been successfully treated, so her mother firmly decided to donate liver to save her. They contacted the surgeons from department of liver surgery in Renji Hospital through wechat. Despite the glimmer new hope, but how to raise money for the cost of liver transplantation surgery and treatment by the young parents, whose economic source of financing was only by selling shoes? Ranran’s Dad hopelessly considered borrowing usury, and the grandparents at home wanted to give up treatment. Things turn for the better occurred after knowing the disease and family situation of the child by surgeons from department of liver surgery in Renji Hospital, who replied: "Come on, save the child first, leave the other things for later discussion." Under the encouragement of this sentence, Ranran’s parents hopefully and queasily admitted her to pediatric ward of department of liver surgery in Renji Hospital. Director of department of liver surgery Qiang Xia led medical team to do a thorough preoperative preparation for Ranran, and meanwhile applied charitable fund for her.

November 10, Qiang Xia as director surgeon, Ranran was successfully implemented the living donor liver transplantation, becoming the 500th liver transplantation child in Renji Hospital. The breakthrough of 500 cases of pediatric liver transplantations at single center will become another milestone of liver transplantation in China.
According to Professor Qiang Xia, nearly 10,000 Chinese infants and young children died every year because of the lack of effective treatment for end-stage liver diseases. In most cases, liver transplantation is the only way to save them, but a lot of sick children’s home lost opportunity of the treatment due to economic reasons. In order to save these children, Qiang Xia’s team established the country's first pediatric liver transplantation ward, and set up China's first "Biliary Atresia Children's Home". They also set up platform of charitable relief for infants’ and young children’s liver transplantation and initiated the formation of the country's first and most influential liver transplantation patients club. In 2014, more than 70% of patients were subjected to different degrees of financial assistance to complete their pediatric liver transplantation surgeries in the hospital. It is the community care and help that enable these special children and their families to bravely overcome the diseases and reborn.

In recent years, liver transplantation team of Renji Hospital has filled many gaps for China in four areas, including key technologies in infants’ and young children’s liver transplantations, application of immunosuppressive agents and immune monitoring, analysis of curative effects of donor-recipient surgeries and prognostic impact factors, as well as basic research in ischemia-reperfusion injury. They gradually apply living donor liver transplantation technology, which represents the latest technological advances in the field of liver surgery today, into traditional liver surgery of liver cancer resection. Currently they have formed a characterized discipline which set pediatric and adult liver transplantation as a symbol technology, and clinical treatment and basic research of end-stage liver diseases and liver cancer as one unit. So far, the youngest child who received liver transplantation surgery in Renji Hospital is less than five months old, and the maximum is 15 years old, mainly from provinces all over the country and Southeast Asian countries. In 2014 these pediatric liver transplantation surgeries had covered 14 kinds of children's liver and genetic metabolic diseases, with 1-year and 5-year postoperative survival rate of 93.1% and 80% respectively, which were more than 10% higher than the national average levels. The team also led the development of the first "Chinese Pediatric Liver Transplantation Guideline", to promote the use of technical specifications in the country, so that greatly improve the survival rate of liver transplantation children and allow more children for treatment. In 2014, the project titled " Establishment and clinical application of key technologies in pediatric liver transplantation" led by Qiang Xia won the first prize of the Scientific and Technological Progress Award of Higher School Outstanding Achievements of Scientific Research, the first prize of Chinese Medical Science and Technology Award and the first prize of Shanghai Medical Technology Award, which is also nominated in the final assessment stage of the first prize of 2015 Shanghai Science and Technology Award.
(Correspondent Publicity Division / Translator Weiwei Zhang)