Postoperative virtual pressure difference as a new index for the risk assessment of liver resection from biomechanical analysis

Abstract

In the realm of hepatectomy, traditional methods for postoperative risk assessment are limited in their ability to provide comprehensive and intuitive evaluations of donor risk. To address this issue, there is a need for the development of more multifaceted indicators to assess the risk in hepatectomy donors. In an effort to improve postoperative risk assessments, a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model was developed to analyze blood flow properties, such as streamlines, vorticity, and pressure, in 10 eligible donors. By comparing the correlation between vorticity, maximum velocity, postoperative virtual pressure difference and TB, a novel index - postoperative virtual pressure difference - was proposed from a biomechanical perspective. This index demonstrated a high correlation (0.98) with total bilirubin values. Donors who underwent right liver lobe resections had greater pressure gradient values than those who underwent left liver lobe resected donors due to the denser streamlines and higher velocity and vorticity values of the former group. Compared with traditional medical methods, the biofluid dynamic analysis using CFD offers advantages in terms of accuracy, efficiency, and intuition.

Keywords: Biofluid dynamics; Computational fluid dynamics simulation; Liver lobe transplantation; Postoperative risk assessment.