Two patients with hepatorenal syndrome were treated by insertion of a peritoneovenous shunt. The renal deficit was corrected rapidly in both cases. A 62-year-old woman with a slow onset syndrome with urine output of 100 to 150 ml/day and urinary sodium excretion of 1 mEq/day responded with large volume urinary output and sodium excretion. She is alive with minimal ascites 18 months after shunt. A 53-year-old man with severe nutritional cirrhosis, alcoholic hepatitis, and eventual massive necrosis was treated for bleeding esophageal varices by portacaval shunt. Postoperative massive ascites progressed to acute hepatorenal syndrome. Insertion of a peritoneovenous shunt reversed the renal deficit. HE eventually exsanguinated due to a hemorrhagic diathesis caused by massive hepatic necrosis.