American doctors successfully performed the second pig kidney transplant to a human
On January 20, a team of doctors from the Heersink School of Medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB, USA) announced that they had successfully performed the second pig kidney transplant to a human. However, this is the first time the transplant has been performed inside the body of a brain-dead recipient.
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| Doctors during a pig kidney transplant surgery for humans in New York, USA. Photo: NYU/Reuters |
Experts hope advances in the field known as xenotransplantation could solve the long-standing shortage of donated organs.
“Today's results are a huge success for humanity,” said Dr. Selwyn Vickers, at UAB.
The first pig-to-human kidney transplant was performed by a team of doctors at NYU Langone on September 25, 2021, involving a brain-dead patient who needed a ventilator and whose family gave permission for the experiment. Doctors grafted the kidney onto blood vessels from one of the patient's legs for observation and biopsy. The team also performed a similar experiment on November 22, 2021.
In the second transplant, performed on September 30, 2021, doctors inserted two kidneys from a genetically modified pig into the body of a 57-year-old brain-dead male patient. In a statement after the transplant was completed, UAB stated: “The two transplanted kidneys circulated blood, produced urine and, most importantly, were not rejected.” The two kidneys continued to function well until the end of the study 77 hours after the transplant, and the results were published in the journal “American Journal of Transplantation” after being reviewed by experts.
Because the kidney is completely inside the body, UAB said the experimental transplant is a step closer to becoming a clinical reality. The team plans to soon test it on healthy people and will seek approval to perform this type of xenotransplantation.
The pig whose kidney was used had 10 key genetic changes that made the organs more compatible with humans. All of the pigs involved in the four pig-to-human transplants were raised together at Revivicor, a facility of the biotechnology company United Therapeutics Corporation. Previous research has found such pigs to be compatible with primates.
According to official US figures, there are nearly 107,000 Americans waiting for organ transplants, of which 90,000 need a kidney. 17 people waiting for organ transplants die every day.
