Doctors transplant pig’s heart into patient in world first
US surgeons at the University of Maryland School of Medicine say the 'breakthrough' could provide a new option for organ transplantation
Doctors say a US man implanted with a genetically modified pig’s heart is doing well, three days after the first-of-its-kind surgery.
The procedure, performed by a team at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, is among the first to demonstrate the feasibility of a pig-to-human heart transplant.
Dr Bartley Griffith, who performed the transplant, described it as “breakthrough surgery” that took medicine one step closer to solving the organ shortage crisis.
“We are proceeding cautiously, but we are also optimistic that this first-in-the-world surgery will provide an important new option for patients in the future,” said Dr Griffith, the director of the cardiac transplant program at the university’s medical centre.
