Retrospective Cohort Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2025. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Transplant. Jun 18, 2025; 15(2): 99401
Published online Jun 18, 2025. doi: 10.5500/wjt.v15.i2.99401
Changes in the liver transplant evaluation process during the early COVID-19 era and the role of telehealth
Ashley H Jowell, Allison J Kwong, Reshma Reguram, Tami J Daugherty, Paul Yien Kwo
Ashley H Jowell, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC 27710, United States
Allison J Kwong, Tami J Daugherty, Paul Yien Kwo, Department of Medicine, Stanford University, Redwood City, CA 94063, United States
Reshma Reguram, Department of Medicine, Trinity Health, Pontiac, MI 48341, United States
Author contributions: Jowell AH, Kwo PY, and Daugherty TJ designed the original research project; Jowell AH and Reguram R conducted the retrospective chart review; Kwong AJ provided statistical expertise and conducted the research analysis as well as helped write the methods; Jowell AH wrote the initial draft of the manuscript, with feedback and edits from all co-authors; Kwo PY served as the project’s principal investigator and provided iterative guidance and detailed feedback throughout all stages of the project.
Institutional review board statement: This study was approved by the Stanford University Institutional Review Board, Panel on Medical Human Subjects in accordance with both the Declarations of Helsinki and Istanbul (Institutional Review Board number 40095).
Informed consent statement: This study received a waiver of informed consent.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no conflict of interest.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement—checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement—checklist of items.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Paul Yien Kwo, FAASLD, AGAF, FACG, MD, Professor, Department of Medicine, Stanford University, 430 Broadway, Pavilion C 3rd Floor, Redwood City, CA 94063, United States. pkwo@stanford.edu
Received: July 22, 2024
Revised: November 25, 2024
Accepted: December 25, 2024
Published online: June 18, 2025
Processing time: 214 Days and 7.9 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: The coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic led to a shift to telehealth for liver transplant (LT) evaluations (LTEs). In this study, the authors found that telehealth did not have an impact on likelihood of listing, waitlist mortality, or evaluation length for patients undergoing LTE. These findings suggest that telehealth is a safe alternative for LTEs, and that outcomes are no different to in-person evaluations. These findings have important implications: Telehealth can help improve access to LT services, especially as telehealth can be of increased convenience to patients.