A surgeon successfully transplanted a pig kidney into a woman. Will animals solve the shortage of available organs?
More than 100,000 Americans are waiting for an organ replacement. A breakthrough surgery offers hope animals may help fill the void.NEW YORK – Dr. Robert Montgomery planned for this moment for three years.
Scientists for decades have dreamed of xenotransplantation: using animals to solve the shortage of organs available for human transplant. But before tying a person's fate to a pig's organ, Montgomery, head of the Transplant Institute at NYU Langone Health, wanted to prove that the procedure wouldn't trigger an immediate immune attackJumping the species barrier is perilous. In 1984, after years of study, Leonard Bailey, a transplant surgeon at Loma Linda University Medical Center in California, thought he had overcome the immune system's rapid rejection of foreign organs.
If the procedure worked, the next step would be to test a pig organ in a living person, probably someone with a short life expectancy or whose life is in immediate danger. The donation was particularly emotional for Montgomery, coming less than a week after the third anniversary of his own heart transplant.
Montgomery had started a program at NYU allowing such donations. Many people remain uncomfortable accepting an organ from someone with hepatitis C, but treated and cured of the dangerous liver infection before he had any symptoms, Montgomery remains immensely grateful for the gift. The surgical team at NYU Langone Health examines the pig kidney for any signs of rejection. The organ was implanted outside the body to allow for observation and tissue sampling during the 54-hour study period."From an ethical perspective, PETA has always been opposed to the use of sentient animals as warehouses for human spare parts. Animals are not spare parts," Alka Chandna, the organization's vice president of laboratory investigations cases, said in an email.
“To my mind there’s not a fundamental concern there," Pacholczyk said, "since this would be an instance of 'donating one's body to science' after death."Montgomery returned from Virginia – missing the rehearsal dinner – around about 11 p.m., just as others on his team took off from Teterboro Airport in New Jersey, headed to the pig farm. A veterinarian and veterinarian anesthetist were waiting when they arrived and helped perform the surgery.
Transplant surgeons at NYU Langone Health surgically prepare for xenotransplantation. From left: Zoe A. Stewart-Lewis, MD, PhD, associate professor, Department of Surgery, and surgical director, Kidney and Pancreas Transplant Programs; and Bonnie E. Lonze, MD, PhD, assistant professor, Department of Surgery, and director, Incompatible Kidney Transplant Programs.Montgomery chose his volunteer carefully for this reason.
There are lives at stake and the field could be set back years by a failed animal-to-human transplant. At 6:05 a.m., shortly after the cooler arrived, Montgomery indicated he was ready to begin. At 6:22 a.m., Montgomery called a timeout, the pause made before every surgery to ensure the safety and accuracy of the procedure.
But even that proved too long. Plastic surgery residents needed their classroom by Tuesday morning, almost exactly 72 hours away. And the room had to be thoroughly cleaned first. Not to worry, Montgomery told a nervous transplant team member, who brought the time constraint to his attention. It would all work out.
Still, in an abundance of caution, nurses collected blood from everyone in the operating room in case the deceased woman was found to have PERVs in her system. If that happened, they would all need to provide new samples to ensure they hadn’t been infected.
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