The Hepatopulmonary syndrome is a know cause of respiratory failure in cirrhosis. It is a clinical triad characterized by liver
disease generally with portal hypertension, arterial hypoxaemia and precapillary-capillary intrapulmonary vascular dilatation
leading to right and left shunts, ventilation/perfusion defects and diffusion impairment. Its incidence is about 15 to 47% in
patients with acute liver disease but characteristly in chronic liver disease. Shortness of breath, orthodeoxia and platypnoea,
togheter with cyanosis, digital clubbing and spider naevi are common. Its diagnosis on the basis of the pulmonary gas exchange
abnormality and contrast-enhanced echocardiography. The perfusion lung scanning using technetium-labelled macro-aggregates
albumin estimate the shunt fraction. The orthotopic liver transplantation is the only efficacy treatment in patients without several
gas exchange abnormality.
Muñoz C., S. ., Bardi S., A. ., Sapunar P., J. ., & Antolini T., M. . (2006). Síndrome Hepatopulmonar. Revista Hospital Clínico Universidad De Chile, 17(3), pp. 229–37. https://doi.org/10.5354/2735-7996.2006.78254
