Recognize the Disease, Select the Candidate, Manage the Graft — From Pretransplant Workup to the ABIM Certification Exam

Built for physicians preparing for the ABIM Transplant Hepatology Certification Examination, this reference follows the actual clinical arc of the specialty: advanced liver disease severe enough to require transplant, the donor-recipient decisions that make transplant possible, and the years of post-transplant management that follow. It moves from pretransplant decompensation through the alloimmune mechanisms and immunosuppressive pharmacology underlying rejection, infection, and long-term systemic risk, connecting basic science directly to clinical decisions. The organ allocation and consent framework governing the field is covered as its own domain, not an afterthought.

Board-style vignettes and full answer explanations translate dense transplant pharmacology and allocation policy into decisions you can defend at the bedside and on exam day.

Inside, You Will Learn How To

• Work up the transplant candidate — Wilson disease, hemochromatosis, autoimmune and cholestatic liver disease, viral hepatitis, and portal hypertension complications reasoned to a transplant-timing decision.
• Apply Milan criteria correctly — hepatocellular carcinoma staging, downstaging protocols, and exception-point logic when MELD score doesn't capture true risk.
• Evaluate the donor and the pairing — donor risk assessment, living donor ethics and independent advocacy, and donor-recipient compatibility worked through case by case.
• Distinguish rejection from recurrence from infection — cellular versus antibody-mediated rejection, timepoint-specific infectious risk, and recurrence patterns that each demand a different response.
• Manage immunosuppression by mechanism — calcineurin inhibitors, mTOR inhibitors, and antimetabolites reasoned from molecular target to drug-level interpretation to regimen redesign.
• Navigate allocation ethics and regulation — MELD-based equity, exception review, and informed-consent standards governing recipients and living donors alike.
• Rehearse the real exam — a 240-question Comprehensive Exam built at the full researched breadth of the official ABIM blueprint, not narrowed to this book's chapters.

Prepare the way transplant hepatology is actually practiced — open it before your next candidacy conference.