Early Enteral Feeding After Living Donor Liver Transplantation Prevents Infectious Complications: A Prospective Pilot Study

Infectious complications, including bacteria, virus, and fungus, often occur after liver transplantation and are the most frequent causes of in-hospital mortality. The current study prospectively analyze the effect of early enteral feeding in patients after living donor liver transplantation (LDLT) Between January 2013 and August 2013, 36 patients underwent LDLT. These patients were randomly assigned to receive enteral formula via nasointestinal feeding tubes [enteral feeding (EN) group, n = 17] or maintenance on intravenous fluid until oral diets were initiated (control group, n = 19). All patients completed the study. The pretransplant and perioperative characteristics of patients did not differ between the 2 groups. The incidence of bacterial infection was significantly lower in the EN group (29.4%) than in the control group (63.2%) (P = 0.043). In addition, the incidence of bile duct complications in the EN group was lower than in the control group (5.9% versus 31.6%, P = 0.041). Multivariate analysis showed that early enteral feeding was closely associated with bacterial infections (odds ratio, 0.178; P = 0.041). There was no statistically significant difference in nutritional status between the 2 groups. There were no cases of in-hospital mortality. Early enteral feeding after LDLT prevents posttransplant bacterial infection, suggesting the possibility of a reduction of in-hospital mortality as a result of decreased infectious complications.