40 Years Of Heart Transplant Progress, But Donor Shortage Still The Biggest Obstacle, UK

Main Category: Transplants / Organ Donations
Also Included In: Cardiovascular / Cardiology
Article Date: 03 Dec 2007 - 12:00 PDT

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December 3 will have a double significance this year for heart transplant recipient Carole Eadie. As well as being her birthday, the date also marks 40 years since the world's first successful heart transplant.

On the day Carole celebrated her second birthday in 1967, South African surgeon Dr Christian Barnard was making history by successfully transplanting the heart of a road traffic accident victim, Denise Duvall, into patient Louis Washkinsky.

The operation was an international sensation and was closely followed by successful heart transplants at other centres around the world. The UK's first came in 1968 and since then, almost 6,000 UK heart patients have benefited from the surgery that Dr Barnard pioneered.

Almost four decades after the pioneering procedure - on 12 July, 2007 - Carole herself benefited from the life-saving treatment at Papworth Hospital after being diagnosed with cardiomyopathy a year earlier. The 42-year-old mother-of-two will be spending her birthday and the anniversary with her family in Leicester. It will also be an opportunity to mark her new lease of life and remember the donor who made her vital operation possible.

Carole said: "I have been literally given a new lease of life by my heart transplant and there is no amount of thanks that can really convey my appreciation and gratitude to my donor and their family."

Improved drugs and surgical techniques mean that heart transplant patients can expect to live for longer than ever before. However, the number of transplants that can be performed remains tightly constrained by the desperate shortage of donors. More than 28 people died while listed for a heart transplant last year because a suitable donor could not be found in time.

UK Transplant Managing and Transplant Director Chris Rudge said: "The heart is synonymous with kindness and when Dr Barnard showed that even this most symbolic of organs could be given by one person to another, it captured the public imagination.

"Over the years the operation has become more and more successful. With better drugs and improved techniques, survival rates are improving all the time.

"In fact the greatest obstacle we face in providing more transplants for the patients who need them is without a doubt the shortage of donated organs.

"I would encourage everyone who would like to pass on this generous gift of life to others to discuss their wishes with their families and join the NHS Organ Donor Register."

* You can find out more about organ donation by contacting the Organ Donor Line on 0845 60 60 400 or visiting http://www.uktransplant.org.uk

Notes:

- The UK's longest-surviving heart transplant patient is Joe Burnside from Darlington, who received his new heart in February 1980, when he was 50, at Papworth Hospital.

- Britain's first heart transplant - and the tenth such operation after Christian Barnard's world first - was carried out on 3 May 1968 at the National Heart Hospital in Marylebone, London, by a team led by South African-born surgeon Donald Ross.

- The UK's heart transplant programme began in 1979 at Papworth Hospital. The senior surgeon was Sir Terence English, who had worked with Christian Barnard and Donald Ross.

- Last year (April 06-March 07) a total of 162 hearts were transplanted in the UK - 155 heart-only transplants, six combined heart-and-lung transplants and one combined heart-and-kidney transplant.

- 1990 was the year when the most heart transplants (351) were carried out in the UK.

- To date, 5,329 heart transplants have been carried out in the UK according to records maintained by UK Transplant.

- The oldest ever recorded heart transplant recipient was 71 and the youngest was 9 days - the youngest surviving heart transplant recipient in UK had their transplant at 23 days.

- The oldest ever recorded heart donor was aged 65 and the youngest just nine days.

- There are seven heart transplant units in the UK - Papworth Hospital, Cambridge; Harefield Hospital, London; Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham; Freeman Hospital, Newcastle; Wythenshawe Hospital, Manchester; Glasgow Royal Infirmary; and Great Ormond Street Hospital, London. GOSH is one of two hospitals who carry out paediatric heart transplants, the other being the Freeman, which also does adults transplants.

- The average age of heart recipients is 43 - and three times as many males as females have had heart transplants.

- The average adult waiting time for a heart transplant is 103 days, while children typically wait 143 days.

- On success rates for heart transplants, 80% of patients are still alive a year after the operation and after five years, the figure is 69%. Both these figures are improving all the time.

- The most common disease leading to heart transplants are coronary heart disease and dilated cardiomyopathy, in which the heart becomes enlarged and unable to pump blood properly.

- More than 9,000 people in the UK need an organ transplant to save or dramatically improve their lives but the shortage of donors means that around 3,000 transplants can be performed each year. Around 1,000 patients die each year before receiving the second chance of life from an organ transplant.

- UK Transplant is the NHS organisation responsible for matching and allocating donated organs. It is part of NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT), a Special Health Authority within the NHS that manages the National Blood Service, Bio Products Laboratory, and UK Transplant.

http://www.uktransplant.org.uk