US man who got first pig heart transplant dies after 2 months

The first person to receive a heart transplant from a pig has died two months after the groundbreaking experiment the Maryland hospital that performed the surgery announced WednesdayDavid Bennett 57 died Tuesday at the University of Maryland Medical Center Doctors didnt give an exact cause of death saying only that his condition had begun deteriorating several days earlierBennetts son praised the hospital for offering the lastditch experiment saying the family hoped it would help further efforts to end the organ shortageldquoWe are grateful for every innovative moment every crazy dream every sleepless night that went into this historic effortrdquo David Bennett Jr said in a statement released by the University of Maryland School of Medicine ldquoWe hope this story can be the beginning of hope and not the endrdquoDoctors for decades have sought to one day use animal organs for lifesaving transplants Bennett a handyman from Hagerstown Maryland was a candidate for this newest attempt only because he otherwise faced certain death ldquoineligiblerdquo for a human heart transplant bedridden and on life support and out of other optionsAfter the Jan 7 operation Bennetts son told The Associated Press his father knew there was no guarantee it would workPrior attempts at such transplants or xenotransplantation have failed largely because patients bodies rapidly rejected the animal organ This time the Maryland surgeons used a heart from a geneedited pig Scientists had modified the animal to remove pig genes that trigger the hyperfast rejection and add human genes to help the body accept the organAt first the pig heart was functioning and the Maryland hospital issued periodic updates that Bennett seemed to be slowly recovering Last month the hospital released video of him watching the Super Bowl from his hospital bed while working with his physical therapistBennett survived significantly longer with the geneedited pig heart than one of the last milestones in xenotransplantation when Baby Fae a dying California infant lived 21 days with a baboons heart in 1984ldquoWe are devastated by the loss of Mr Bennett He proved to be a brave and noble patient who fought all the way to the endrdquo Dr Bartley Griffith who performed the surgery at the Baltimore hospital said in a statementOther transplant experts praised the Maryland teams landmark research and said Bennetts death shouldnt slow the push to figure out how to use animal organs to save human livesldquoThis was a first step into uncharted territoryrdquo said Dr Robert Montgomery of NYU Langone Health a transplant surgeon who received his own heart transplant ldquoA tremendous amount of informationrdquo will contribute to the next steps as teams at several transplant centers plan the first clinical trialsldquoIt was an incredible feat that he was kept alive for two months and was able to enjoy his family Montgomery addedThe need for another source of organs is huge More than 41000 transplants were performed in the US last year a record including about 3800 heart transplants But more than 106000 people remain on the national waiting list thousands die every year before getting an organ and thousands more never even get added to the list considered too much of a long shotThe Food and Drug Administration had allowed the dramatic Maryland experiment under ldquocompassionate userdquo rules for emergency situations Bennetts doctors said he had heart failure and an irregular heartbeat plus a history of not complying with medical instructions He was deemed ineligible for a human heart transplant that requires strict use of immunesuppressing medicines or the remaining alternative an implanted heart pumpOrgan rejection infections and other complications are risks for any transplant recipient Experts hope the Maryland team quickly publishes in a medical journal exactly how Bennetts body responded to the pig heartFrom Bennetts experience we have gained invaluable insights learning that the genetically modified pig heart can function well within the human body while the immune system is adequately suppressedrdquo said Dr Muhammad Mohiuddin scientific director of the Maryland universitys animaltohuman transplant programOne next question is what evidence from Bennetts experience and some other recent experiments with geneedited pig organs may persuade the FDA to allow a clinical trial ldquo possibly with an organ such as a kidney that isnt immediately fatal if it failsTwice last fall Montgomerys team at NYU got permission from the families of deceased individuals to temporarily attach a geneedited pig kidney to blood vessels outside the body and watch them work before ending life support And surgeons at the University of Alabama at Birmingham went a step further transplanting a pair of geneedited pig kidneys into a braindead man in a stepbystep rehearsal for an operation they hope to try in living patients possibly later this yearPigs have long been used in human medicine including pig skin grafts and implantation of pig heart valves But transplanting entire organs is much more complex than using highly processed tissue The geneedited pigs used in these experiments were provided by Revivicor a subsidiary of United Therapeutics one of several biotech companies in the running to develop suitable pig organs for potential human transplantThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever