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Transplant Medicine
Pig-heart transplant patient dies
The US man who had received a new heart from a genetically modified pig nearly six week ago died on Monday, University of Maryland...
UK girl gets kidney transplant without lifelong drugs
A “reprogrammed” immune system, thanks to a stem cell transplant from her mother, means an eight-year-old girl in Britain is spared the ordeal of...
Kidneys from dying newborns could save more lives, experts say
While some countries – like Britain and America – carry out a few transplants each year using kidneys from babies who died during or...
Second pig-into-human heart transplant in US
Baltimore surgeons have transplanted the heart of a genetically altered pig into a man with terminal heart disease who had no other hope for...
Pig kidney functions in brain-dead man’s body
A pig’s kidney transplanted into a brain-dead man is still functioning normally after more than a month, a critical step towards an operation the...
First UK womb transplant with donated uterus
In the first British case of its kind, surgeons carried out a womb transplant on a woman with a rare condition who received a uterus donated...
Donor liver protects heart transplant in US dual organ surgery
In a historic surgical procedure, an American patient received two donor organs, a liver and a heart, to prevent the extreme likelihood that her...
Higher mortality in heart transplants from Covid donors, analysis finds
Adult heart transplant recipients from donors with active Covid-19 infection had higher mortality at six and 12 months than those with transplants from donors...
Scientists a step closer to building artificial heart for human transplantation
Heart disease is deadly, in part because the heart, unlike other organs, cannot repair itself after injury. That is why tissue engineering, ultimately including the...
Kidneys infected with hepatitis C can be safely transplanted
Kidneys from deceased donors with hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection can be safely transplanted into non-infected recipients when a regimen of direct-acting antiviral therapies...
'Piggy-backing' extends human lung survival and healing
A Vanderbilt and Columbia universities team extended the current six-hour window for human lungs outside the body to 24, as well as triggered damaged...
Liver perfusion could save 7 in 10 rejected donor livers
A major study investigating the effectiveness of liver perfusion as a technique to improve the function of donor livers that would have otherwise been...
New cell therapy prevents immunosuppression-related side effects
A large international study coordinated by University Hospital Regensburg and Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin has demonstrated the safety of new cell therapy approaches for...
Swiss transplantation breakthrough keeps human livers alive for a week
Until now, livers could be stored safely outside the body for only a few hours. With the novel perfusion technology, livers – and even...
Less-than-perfect kidneys can be successfully used for transplants
Based on findings from researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine it has been strongly recommended that harvested kidneys with acute kidney injury (AKI) no longer...
Chinese organ donation statistics may have been falsified
The Chinese government may have been systematically falsifying its organ donation numbers, raising renewed concerns over the use of executed prisoners and other forced...
Wits boosts organ donor numbers with new procurement strategy
The Wits Transplant Unit substantially increased organ donor numbers after revising the way they communicate with families and medical staff after a potential donor...
Transplanting hep-C kidneys to uninfected donors new standard of care — study
Transplantation of kidneys from hepatitis C-infected donors to uninfected recipients is safe and can be successfully implemented as a standard of care, according to...
Severely damaged lungs can be regenerated to transplant criteria
Lung transplantation, the only life-saving therapy for an increasing population of patients with end-stage lung disease, is severely limited by the number of available...
Hepatitis C eradicated in patients following heart transplants
Nine patients at Penn Medicine have been cured of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) following lifesaving heart transplants from deceased donors who were infected...
The complex reasons behind SA's organ donor shortage
While religious and cultural practices play a role in the acute shortage of organ donations, her extensive research as identified other critical factors, writes...
World-first SA liver transplant results support a review of ethics policies
The successful, world-first liver transplant between an HIV-positive woman and her HIV-negative infant, undertaken in South Africa has delivered results, reported in the academic journal...
Transplants with hepatitis C-infected kidneys disease free at 1 year
In a small study, doctors at Johns Hopkins have successfully transplanted 10 hepatitis C-infected kidneys into patients without hepatitis C and prevented the patients...
Transplanting lungs from those over 60 a viable option
With a scarcity of lungs available for transplantation, the use of lungs from donors older than age 60 has been shown to achieve reasonable...
Top UK university used overseas patients as research guinea pigs
Experimental implants that should only have been used in laboratory or animal tests were sent abroad and used on patients who were treated like...
Penile transplant surgery in SA questioned – Stellenbosch study
Roughly 250 traditional circumcisions lead to penile amputation every year in South Africa, with one response being penile transplantation, as carried out in 2014...
SA penile transplant man leading a normal life
Pen ile transplantation restored normal physiological functions in a South African man who is the world's first transplant recipient, without major complications in the...
Gene-edited piglets opening door to animal organ transplants
In a striking advance that helps open the door to organ transplants from animals, researchers have created gene-edited piglets cleansed of viruses that might...
First double hand transplant child can now write, feed and dress independently
The world's first double hand transplant in a child has been successful under carefully considered circumstances, according to a study in The Lancet.
The study...
Patients transplanted with HCV kidneys successfully cured
Ten patients at Penn Medicine have been cured of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) following lifesaving kidney transplants from deceased donors who were infected...
Desensitising antibodies lowers heart rejection risk
The risk of heart transplant rejection can be reduced by desensitising patient antibodies, according to research presented at Heart Failure 2017 and the 4th...
Why I gave my kidney to a stranger — and why you should, too
Becoming part of a chain of donations can unlock literally dozens of life-saving interventions. Dylan Matthews explains in Vox why he donated his kidney...
Team finds way to keep lung functioning outside the body
A multidisciplinary team for the first time maintained a fully functional lung outside the body for several days. In a US study, they describe...
World first lung surgery saves Canadian woman's life
In what is believed to be the first procedure of its kind in the world, doctors in Canada have saved a young mother’s life...
HIV-positive organ donation findings
In the first-of-its-kind study since the passage of the US HIV Organ Policy Equity Act (the HOPE Act), which lifted the ban on organ donations from one HIV-positive person to another, researchers report on the quality of these organs.
Technique may extend donor organ life
Researchers at the RIKEN Centre for Developmental Biology have developed a new technique that extends in rats the time that donor organs last and can also resuscitate organs obtained after cardiac arrest.
Discarded kidneys more viable than thought
Kidneys from deceased donors that have acute injuries are frequently discarded instead of being used for transplant. However, a Yale University-led study finds that such kidneys may be more viable than previously thought.
World's first successful penis transplant
South African doctors have successfully performed the world's first penis transplant on a 21-year-old man whose organ had been amputated three years ago after a botched circumcision. The nine-hour operation, which took place in December, was part of a pilot study by Tygerberg Hospital and the University of Stellenbosch to help the 250 or so young South African men who lose their penises each year after coming-of-age rituals go wrong.
Study looks at 25 years of transplants
Baylor College researchers analysed 25 years of organ transplant data up to 2012 to concluded organ transplantation saved 2.3m years of life in the US. Each transplant saved around 4.3 years of life.