Portal hypertension develops as a result of an increase in resistance or flow of portal blood through the liver vascular system. The increase in vascular resistance might be extrahepatic or intrahepatic in nature. Among all the causes, cirrhosis is the most common. This may lead to portal hypertension syndrome which includes esophageal varices, ascites, encephalopathy, and splenomegaly. The most clinically important complication of the above syndrome is the development of esophageal varices. Esophageal varices are associated with significant risk of upper gastrointestinal bleeding and high mortality.

We are in the process of inviting investigators to contribute original articles as well as review articles that will stimulate the continued effort to understand the pathophysiology behind the development of esophageal varices in cirrhotic and noncirrhotic patients. We would like to describe the spectrum of complications in adults and in the pediatric population, as well as the various treatment modalities and other important clinical issues which are associated with that phenomenon. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• Recent understanding of the mechanism for esophageal varices development in cirrhotic patients
• Clinical manifestations—complications
• Noncirrhotic portal hypertension (acute and chronic portal vein thrombosis, Budd-Chiari syndrome, nodular regenerative hyperplasia, etc.) and the current approach
• Medical approach: indication for screening, mode and frequency of screening, primary treatment, treatment of acute event, and secondary prevention
• Endoscopy treatment
• Other therapies: TIPS (indications, risk, complications), surgical
• Anticoagulation in portal HTN
• Pediatric manifestations of portal HTN

Articles published in this special issue will not be subject to the journal's Article Processing Charges.

Before submission authors should carefully read over the journal's Author Guidelines, which are located at http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijhep/guidelines/. Prospective authors should submit an electronic copy of their complete manuscript through the journal Manuscript Tracking System at http://mts.hindawi.com/ according to the following timetable: