Race against clock for boy needing liver

A one-year-old boy is in desperate need of a liver transplant as he suffers from acute liver failure.

Hayson Au Pak-hei is in critical condition in the intensive care unit of Queen Mary Hospital. He needs a liver transplant today, his family said yesterday.

The boy is an only child and lives with his parents and grandmother.

Acute liver failure refers to the rapid loss of liver function in days or weeks, usually in a person who has no pre-existing liver disease.

Acute failure refers to the rapid loss of liver function in days or weeks, usually in a person who has no preexisting liver disease.

The family is appealing to people between 18 and 60 years old with a blood type of A or O and a body mass index lower than 30 to donate a part of their liver. The donor must have no drug and alcohol abuse issues.

Au's mother said her son had a fever on Friday night and was taken to a private doctor the following day.

He was prescribed some anti-fever drugs, painkillers and anti-inflammatory medication after being diagnosed with roseola infantum, a common viral infection that can cause fever and rashes in babies and young children.

But the toddler vomited after taking the medication and his family brought him to a public hospital in Pok Fu Lam on Sunday where his condition deteriorated rapidly.

The mother said she watched her son go from "slowly entering into a coma to having liver failure."

She said the boy's liver function index was at 6,400 - 160 times over the normal range of 40 - by the time he was admitted.

"Now the number is so high that the machine can no longer show it," she said, adding that the child's liver coagulation factors are also affected.

The cause of the boy's condition remains unknown.

"He cannot wait till the report is out as he needs to have the operation immediately," she said.

Unfortunately, the father's B blood type is not a match. The mother is also unable to be the donor as she does not fall into the required weight range.

The mother said her brother-in-law's liver is a match but they are waiting for confirmation.

She added that the one-year-old is a happy baby and rarely cries, and hopes there will be kind people willing to save her boy.

"We have to find a suitable donor on Monday at the latest and have the operation today," she said, adding that five to six people have come to the hospital for the transplant match test.

The family appealed to the public yesterday on Facebook in a post that has now gone viral.

Albert Chan Chi-yan, Au's attending doctor and the deputy director of Liver Transplant Center at Queen Mary Hospital, said the child already has acute liver failure though the cause remains unknown.

The doctor said Au's liver enzyme levels reached 7,000, which is significantly higher than the normal level. He believed the boy's liver cells show signs of necrosis -- a premature death of cells or tissues.

He added the boy's current liver coagulation factors are ten times higher than average, which poses a higher chance of bleeding such as cerebral hemorrhage, which can cause damage to the brain.

"It will be too late to have a liver transplant by then," he said.

Au is currently undergoing plasma transfusion in hopes of lowering his liver coagulation factors.