Since 1998, the Surgery and Liver Transplant Units and the Experimental Hepatology unit of Hospital La Fe in Valencia have been closely cooperating in a joint effort which has led to an important collection of human livers. The great majority of these organs come from donors whose livers were not suitable for transplant, steatosis being the most common cause of this. In November 2007 the strategic action in area 3 of the CIBEREHD was approved enabling specific areas in the hospital, appropriate installations and professionalised management, thus making room for the valuable collection of existing liver samples. The Steatotic Liver Collection (CHE) of the CIBEREHD forms part of the structure of the Biobank of the Hospital Universitari i Politècnic La Fe (Biobanco La Fe). It was set up with the aim of allowing researchers interested in studying liver steatosis to make use of samples of human hepatic tissue, as well as sub-fractions and other duly characterised biological samples with controlled traceability.
The number of cases kept in La Fe Biobank currently comes to 173 livers, with a wide range of degrees of steatosis, which have been registered, classified and characterised in terms of metabolic activity (biotransformation) and basic lipid profile. The Biobank also has samples of control liver tissue (not steatotic).
This is a publicly owned biobank, according to the requirements of Royal Decree 1716/2011, of 18th November, on basic requisites for authorisation and operation of biobanks. La Fe Biobank has implemented a Quality Management System based on ISO 9001 standard. The Biosecurity of the Biobank abides by what is established in the good practice manuals of the laboratory and the Good Practice Manual of the National Platform.
