11.   He collapsed from acute renal failure.

12.   Twenty five patients with acute liver failure were measured for hepatic venous pressure gradient as an index of portal pressure during the course of a transjugular liver biopsy.

13.   The aetiology of acute liver failure was viral hepatitis in all but one patients.

14.   It has been shown that the development of ascites is also common in acute liver failure, and has been related to the presence of severe portal hypertension.

15.   The site of increased resistance in patients with acute liver failure has not been clearly established.

16.   This may indicate that other factors also play an important role in increasing hepatic venous pressure gradient in acute liver failure.

17.   The present study also shows a high prevalence of ascites in patients with acute liver failure.

18.   This would suggest that, as in cirrhosis, portal hypertension plays an important role in the pathogenesis of ascites in acute liver failure.

19.   Renal failure was common in the present series of patients with acute liver failure.

20.   As in this condition, functional renal failure in acute liver failure has been related to an imbalance between neurohumoral factors with renal vasoconstrictive activity and renal vasodilators.