Pre-operative assessment of living liver donors’ liver anatomy and volumes

Decades of experience supports LDLT as a favorable strategy to reduce waitlist mortality. The multiple regenerative pathways of hepatocytes and other hepatic cells justify the rationale behind it. Nonetheless, living liver donation is still underused and its broader implementation is challenging, mostly due to variability in practices leading to concerns related to donor safety. A non-systematic literature search was conducted for peer-reviewed original articles related to pre-operative evaluation of living liver donor candidates. Eligible studies were synthesized upon consensus for discussion in this up-to-date review. Review of the literature demonstrate that the importance of preoperative assessment of vascular, biliary and liver volume to ensure donor safety and adequate surgical planning for graft procurement is widely recognized. Moreover, data indicates that anatomic variants in vascular and biliary systems in healthy donors are common, present in up to 50