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Animal-To-Human Organ Transplantation Is Advancing, And Could Save Millions Of Lives

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Getting an organ transplant is an incredible feat of medical advancement, however, it’s incredibly hard to achieve. With over 100,000 people on the national waiting list in the US, thousands of patients die every year while waiting, and thousands of others aren’t even able to be added to the list.

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Surgeons Implant Genetically-Edited Pig’s Kidneys Into Brain-Dead Patient

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Thanks to medical developments, bacon may not be the only piece of a pig heading into your body. On Thursday, the results of a surgery that saw doctors transplant a genetically-altered pig’s kidneys into a brain-dead patient’s abdomen were published in the American Journal of Transplantation.

The surgery had been conducted back on Sept. 30 in Birmingham, Alabama, while the patient — 57-year-old James Parsons — was declared brain-dead after suffering blunt trauma from a dirt bike race accident.

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The pig’s kidneys were transplanted just as typical human’s organs would be, and the results were certainly encouraging – the kidneys survived over the course of three days until Parsons was taken off life support.

Speaking to the Associated Press, the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Dr. Jayme Locke — the lead of the study — explained he had initial doubts, not knowing if the pig kidney blood vessels could withstand human blood pressure force (which they were able to).

While one kidney was damaged during the removal, the other kidney successfully produced urine, while no pig cells or viruses were found in Parsons. For Locke, the operation could signal a huge relief when it comes to transplantations in the medical world. “The organ shortage is in fact an unmitigated crisis and we’ve never had a real solution to it,” he said.

Despite 2021 seeing a record-breaking number of total organ transplants with over 41,000, there are still 106,553 men, woman, and children on the national transplant waiting list, while 17 people die each day waiting for a transplant according to the Health Resources and Service Administration (HRSA)

The study continues the flurry of animal-to-human transplants, also known as xenotransplantation. Earlier this month, a pig’s heart was transplanted to 57-year-old patient David Bennett, who had been deemed ineligible for traditional heart transplant. While the seven-hour transplant was successful, his long-terms odds of survival are yet to be seen.

Surgeons also previously implanted a pig’s kidneys to a pair of blood vessels outside a deceased patient’s body to observe what would happen in October. Like Locke’s transplant, the kidney in this situation functioned normally as well, producing both urine and filtering waste.

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However, the AP noted that there is still some hurdles needed to be jumped before doctors can began implanting pig kidneys into living patients. The scientists also need to determine how long pig organs can function within the human body, and what kind of genetic alterations are needed for each kind of organ.

As for why pigs are frequently used in xenotransplantation, BIO explained that the animal’s ability to breed and mature quickly, along with its organs — which are close in size and functionality to a human’s — make them an ideal specimen. Pigs can also be highly health when bred in controlled environments.

Scientists had looked towards primates as possible xenotransplantation specimens,given their similarities to humans. However, primates’ organs greatly differ in size than humans, and also have a greater chance of spreading disease between the subjects. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a de facto ban on clinical trials between human and non-human primates in 1999.

NY Doctors Perform First Double Hands And Face Transplant 

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This Wednesday, doctors at NYU Langone Medical Center announced that after 23 long hours in surgery they had performed the first successful face and double hands transplant on 22-year-old Joe Dimeo.

Back in 2018, 20-year-old Joe Dimeo fell asleep at the wheel of his car on Route 22 in New Jersey, causing him to lose control, hit a curb and flip his vehicle over, completely engulfing it in flames. Luckily a bystander was able to pull Dimeo out of the car before it exploded, but the young adult still suffered third-degree burns over nearly 80% of his body. 

The damage was so severe that he was left without eyelids, ears, and parts of his fingers. The scarring from the burns limited his range of motion and partially covered his eyes making it difficult to see. It’s for these reasons that Dimeo was so motivated to work with his doctors in performing this historic surgery. 

Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez is the head of the team that completed the surgery, and told the media this Wednesday that Dimeo is “the most highly motivated patient [he’s] ever met.” The surgery actually occurred in August of last year, however, the team of doctors wanted to wait and ensure that Dimeo’s body wouldn’t reject the transplants before calling the surgery a complete success. 

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“There have been over a hundred hand transplants performed successfully, and close to 50 face transplants, so fundamentally there was no reason why they couldn’t occur together, successfully.”

There have only ever been two other attempts to complete a double hand and face transplant simultaneously worldwide but both were unfortunately unsuccessful. “We needed to avoid infection, we needed to have this operation occur as fast as possible, we had to be very selective with the donor, and we had to implement every state of the art technology that would ensure complete success of Joe’s operation, and that’s exactly what we did.”

“Joe is healthy, he’s young, he’s strong, he loves to exercise, he eats healthy, and he has that one special element which is going to be required for this operation, a high level of motivation and a tremendous sense of hope.”

The operation took 80 healthcare professionals spread across six surgical teams and two adjoining operating rooms to complete. One of the operating rooms was used to carefully retrieve the hands and facial tissue from the dying donor, which are then typically replaced with 3D prosthetics according to Rodriguez. 

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“We always begin the operation with a moment of silence to honor the donor family, to respect their great loss, to never forget the donations that have been made. In all these operations it’s important to recognize that someone must give up their life so that others can continue living,” Rodriguez said. 

In the other room Dimeo was being meticulously prepared to receive the transplants. The surgery itself is long, grueling, and dangerous, and if done incorrectly would have resulted in the end of Dimeo’s life as well. Rodriguez explained that for each hand they had to replace “21 tendons, three major nerves, five major vessels, and two major bones,” and that’s not even including the face. 

After 23 hours in surgery and 45 days in intensive care, followed by two months of impatient rehab, Dimeo learned to open his new eyelids, more his new hands, and smile for the first time in years. Dimeo also recently spoke with the press about wanting to share his story and tell people to never give up on life. 

“I want to share my story to give people hope in the world. I’d like to recognize the selflessness of my donor, and how none of this would be possible without his sacrifice. Thank you. I feel like I’ve been given a second chance at life. There’s no excuse to not be motivated, or not to do my therapy. My hands aren’t there yet. I have to keep practicing, it’s kind of like when you’re a baby, they’re just moving their hands all the time until they get that ability to do stuff. I’ve got new hands now, just like them. There’s always light at the end of the tunnel. You never give up.”