A scoring system for the assessment of the risk of mortality after partial hepatectomy in patients with chronic liver dysfunction.

Background/purpose: The aim of this study is to evaluate a new scoring system, called the chronic liver dysfunction (CLD) score, for prediction of the surgical risk of partial hepatectomy in patients with chronic liver damage. Morbidity and mortality rates after gastroenterological surgery are high in patients with hepatic cirrhosis. Accordingly, it is very important to assess the surgical risk in such patients before surgery. Although the Child classification (or Child-Pugh score) has been a standard system, it did not always accurately predict patients at the risk of mortality after gastroenterological surgery, especially partial hepatectomy.

Methods: In 1985, we established a new system called the CLD score, reviewing the patients undergoing gastroenterological operations at one hospital. In the present study, we prospectively used the CLD score in 256 consecutive patients with chronic liver dysfunction who were treated surgically by partial hepatectomy, and investigated the usefulness of the CLD score concerning mortality. The results were compared with those of the Child-Pugh score (C-P score).

Results: After major hepatectomy, all the patients with CLD score exceeding 1.5 died of hepatic failure. After minor hepatectomy, all the patients with CLD score exceeding 2.5 died of hepatic failure. On the other hand, C-P score did not predict the outcome in these patients.

Conclusions: Compared with the C-P score, which was considered the gold standard scoring system for assessing surgical risk for patients with chronic liver dysfunction, our CLD score provides a more reliable assessment of the risk of partial hepatectomy.