Surgical therapy for portal hypertension (PHT) in patients with cirrhosis has long been controversial,and various operative approaches have been used to prevent or manage such lethal complications as gastroesophageal variceal hemorrhage. However, over a century various portazygos devascularization and shunt approaches have been developed or modified, but the therapeutic effects have not been satisfactory till 1963 when Starzl did the first liver transplantation in the world, which provides a new hope to the surgical treatment of PHT.