Renaissance of Modified Charlson Comorbidity Index in Prediction of Short- and Long-Term Survival After Liver Transplantation?

BACKGROUND Orthotopic liver transplantation (OLT) is the standard of care for end-stage liver disease. The Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI) was originally created to assess the survival rate of patients with chronic diseases, although it was modified and adopted in OLT recipients as CCI-OLT. MATERIAL AND METHODS In total of 248 consecutive liver transplant recipients with viral cirrhosis in 98 (39.5%) patients were included. CCI-OLT was calculated assigning a weight of 3 to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; weight of 2 to coronary artery disease, connective tissue disease, and renal insufficiency; and a weight of 1 to diabetes mellitus. RESULTS CCI-OLT was significantly correlated with recipient age (p