Surgeons transplanted to the fourth patient transplanted
The surgeons in Boston successfully transplanted the kidney of a genetically modified pig last month into a 66-year-old man with kidney failure, the Massachusetts General Hospital said on Friday.
It was the fourth pig criminal transplantation in the United States, and the first of three, which was carried out as part of a new clinical study at Mass General, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Two of the previous patients died shortly after the procedure, including one who was critically ill before the transplant.
More than 100,000 people in the country are located on waiting lists for transplant organs, mainly kidneys, but there is an acute lack of human donor organs. Many people will die while waiting.
In order to relieve the deficiency, several biotech companies process the genes of pigs in such a way that their organs are not easily rejected by the human body.
The new clinical study in which organs are used by the Biotech company Egenesis is one of two studies with genetically modified animal organs that received a green light from the regulatory authorities at the beginning of this week. The other, sponsored by the United Therapeutics Corporation, will start with six patients later this year, but this number could ultimately increase to 50.
The latest transplant recipient, Tim Andrews from Concord, NH, was operated on at the end of January and was good enough to be released a week later.
“When I got out of the recreation room and went to the intensive care unit, I actually tap between the table and my bed,” said Andrews in an interview on Thursday. “I’m so happy, it’s incredible.”
Mr. Andrews has been in kidneylysis for more than two years and lasted hours, Thursday and Saturday. They made him tired and sick most of the time, and he couldn’t work or do much in the house.
He had a heart attack shortly after the start of dialysis, and in August in August, when he discussed the possibility of transplantation with mass general doctors, he used a wheelchair. They told him that he had to come in a better form for the operation, so he started physiotherapy and walking.
Like Towana Looney, a woman from Alabama who received a pork for the Nyu Langone Health in November, Mr. Andrews said that he felt better after the operation than in years.
“It’s like a new engine – suddenly I had an energy machine in me,” he said.
Even if the swine organs have proven to be safe and effective, it is unclear what they would cost and whether they would be covered by insurance. Most patients with kidney failure cannot work and are covered by the state health plan Medicare.
The kidney that Mr. Andrews received came from a pig that had undergone 69 gene edits, including 59 to inactivate pigs to reduce the risk of infection for humans.
Two patients with transplants with pigs last year died shortly after the procedures, including Lisa Pisano from New Jersey, who had operated on New York and whose kidney was developed by United Therapeutics Corporation and Richard Slayman from Massachusetts, which received an EGENESE kidney at Mass General.
Dr. Tatsuo Kawai, the main surgeon, who was involved in the operations at Mass General, said that the doctors have learned all the time.
The aim is to “make genetically processed swine organs a viable, long -term solution for patients,” said Dr. Kawai in an explanation. “Although we still have a long way to make this reality, this transplant is an important next step.”
