image source, University of Maryland School of Medicine
Caption,
Surgeon Bartley P Griffith with his patient David Bennett shortly following the pig heart transplant.
The first person in the world to receive a genetically modified heart from a pig by transplant has died.
David Bennett, who suffered from terminal heart disease, survived two months following surgery in the United States.
But his condition began to deteriorate several days agoexplained his doctors in Baltimore City, and the 58-year-old patient died on March 8.
Bennett knew of the risks associated with the surgery, acknowledging before the procedure that it was “a shot in the dark.”
Doctors at the University of Maryland Medical Center obtained a special waiver from the US regulator to perform the procedure, on the grounds that Bennett’s condition – confined to a bed – was terminal.
He underwent the surgery on January 7, and doctors say that in the weeks that followed he spent time with his family, watched the Super Bowl football game and talked regarding wanting to come home to his dog, Lucky..
However, his condition deteriorated, leaving the doctors “devastated”.
“He proved to be a brave and noble patient who fought to the end,” surgeon Bartley Griffith, who performed the transplant, said in a statement released by the hospital.
Griffith has previously said the surgery would bring the world “one step closer to solving the organ shortage crisis.” Currently, 17 people a day die in the US waiting for a transplant, while there are reports of more than 100,000 patients on the waiting list in that country.
The possibility of using animal organs to meet human demand – a process called xenotrasplante– has been considered for a long time, and the use of pig heart valves is already a common procedure.
In October 2021, doctors in New York announced the successful transplant of a pig’s kidney into a human. Until then, the operation was the most advanced experiment in that field.
However, on that occasion, the patient was brain dead and had no hope of recovery.
