Liver Exchange

肝移植可以挽救肝功能衰竭患者的生命，但对移植的需求超过了供体的数量。因此，如果我们找到更好的方法来利用所有潜在的捐助者，就可以挽救生命。该奖项资助的研究是建立在以前的努力基础上，利用经济理论来改善移植患者的预后。该团队将专注于新的理论和方法，可以应用于活体肝脏移植的独特方面。捐献者有两个肺叶（左肺叶和右肺叶），可以捐献一个。左肺叶较小，捐献左肺叶对捐赠者来说风险较小。但是，耳瓣必须足够大以支持接收方。组织相容性也是一个问题。许多有意愿的捐赠者要么不能给他们所爱的人捐款，要么只能通过更大、风险更大的捐赠来实现。该团队希望开发出一种方法，使更多的患者与捐赠者匹配，同时最大限度地降低捐赠者的风险。该项目将需要新的技术方法，超越以前的器官（肾脏）交换工作。该项目发展了经济理论中的新思想，并提出了具体的方法，这些方法可以在交换中心实施，使捐助者与受援者相匹配。因此，该奖项有可能拯救生命。这个项目将分几个不同的阶段进行。第一个将考虑大小兼容性问题，假设每个受体与一个活体供体匹配。第二阶段将模拟一种医学上可行的替代方案：需要大肝脏的受者可能会与两名捐献者相匹配，这两名捐献者各捐献一个小肝脏。在这种情况下，接受者接受两个捐赠器官。研究小组将首先开发一种交换方法，假设每个接受者有两个亲人愿意捐献（至少一个组织不相容），并将与两个捐赠者匹配。第三阶段考察的是，如果允许不平衡的交换，是否有可能产生更好的结果；也就是说，患者可能只提供一个供体（肝脏很大，因此捐赠很大），并接受两个小捐赠。该团队将开发新的机制设计理论工具，使用具有多维晶格兼容性要求的离散和连续图来模拟尺寸兼容性和血型兼容性。

Liver transplants can save the lives of people with liver failure, but the need for transplants exceeds the number of donors. As a result, lives can be saved if we find better ways to use all potential donors. This award funds research that builds on previous efforts to use economic theory to improve outcomes for transplant patients. The team will focus on new theories and methods that can be applied to the unique aspects of liver transplant from living donors. Donors have two lobes (left and right) and can donate one. The left lobe is smaller, and donating this lobe is less risky for the donor. However, the lobe must be large enough to support the recipient. Tissue compatibility is also an issue. Many willing donors either cannot donate to their loved one or can only do so by making a larger, riskier donation. The team wants to develop methods that will make it possible to match more patients with donors while also minimizing donor risks. The project will require new technical methods beyond previous work in organ (kidney) exchange. This project develops new ideas in economic theory and proposes specific methods that can be implemented in clearinghouses that can match donors with recipients. The award therefore has the potential to save lives.The project will proceed in several distinct stages. The first will consider the size compatibility issue assuming that each recipient is matched to one living donor. The second stage will model a medically feasible alternative: a recipient needing a large liver might be matched with two donors who each donate a small lobe. In this case the recipient receives two donor organs. The research team will first develop an exchange method assuming that each recipient has two loved ones who are willing to donate (at least one tissue incompatible) and will be matched with two donors. The third stage examines whether or not even better outcomes might be possible if unbalanced exchanges are allowed; that is, a patient may provide only one donor (with a large liver and therefore a large donation) and receive two small donations. The team will develop new theoretical tools in mechanism design, using discrete and continuum graphs with multi-dimensional lattice compatibility requirements to model size compatibility and blood type compatibility.