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Donor in 1st successful transplant dies

by KimW
10 replies
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Donated the first kidney transplant to his twin brother,proving transplanted organs were possible, and opening the path to all types or organ donations.

Donor in first successful U.S. transplant dies - Health - Health care - msnbc.com
  • Profile picture of the author Kay King
    When you think about it - he probably affected more lives than any of the heros featured in news stories every day.

    Amazing what can happen when one person takes a big risk to help another, isn't it?
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  • Profile picture of the author Patrician
    Lived to a ripe old age and did good things.

    May he rest in peace.
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  • Profile picture of the author HeySal
    One more reason for the world to salute pioneers of any realm.
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  • Profile picture of the author seasoned
    Murray thought the odds of a transplanted organ being accepted would be enhanced since they were identical twins.
    MY THOUGHTS EXACTLY! ALL this proved was that they knew how to connect THAT kidney, and the procedure was fine. As far as proving tissue typing, general compatiblity, etc..., that you would need to consider in almost all cases, it didn't really PROVE anything.

    I mean how many siblings have a living monozygotic twin that can, and is willing, and ABLE to, give them an organ, or even TISSUE, where theirs was damaged through some known condition that doesn't, and won't, affect the donor?

    I'm sorry to hear he died, but he lived a pretty long life and died of unrelated circumstances.

    Steve
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  • Profile picture of the author KimW
    I have to admit, up until I saw this article, I had always thought the first organ transplant was the heart transplant.
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    • Profile picture of the author seasoned
      Originally Posted by KimW View Post

      I have to admit, up until I saw this article, I had always thought the first organ transplant was the heart transplant.
      I never really thought about it, but I guess I would have thought the same. Maybe that is because the first person to transplant a heart apparently went against the hospital, etc... and won a LOT of acclaim for the success.

      But replacing a heart is VERY complex! There are probably a few more blood vessels to deal with than with the kidneys. Some of them are HUGE! Adult aortas are generally anywhere from about 1"(small normal, like mine) to like 2.5"(marfans sufferers). It is HIGH PRESSURE! There is a critical time limit. Then there is the pericardium. THEN the rsib cage. etc... I STILL don't know how they pulled me apart. They cut down the middle of my sternum, so the front of my rib cage was in about one piece. You can still see the wire ties used to reattach it on the xray. And they somehow managed to remove it, or work around it. That ledger demain is even odder considering that they had to remove muscle to get me on bypass. HEY, anyone know how they open the ribcage, etc? And a little mistake, like puncturing a lung, or the aorta, can be deadly.

      So it is FAR harder to replace a heart than a kidney. So I would hope the first attempt would be on something around the lower abdomen.

      Steve
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      • Profile picture of the author Kay King
        I knew kidney transplants came first (or at least thought they did) but I remember clearly my personal thoughts when heart transplants were first done.

        If you recall, there were big stories about the "successful transplants" yet the first recipients died within a few weeks or months. Considering the difficulty of exchanging a heart, not surprising.

        I used to wonder why anyone would opt for a heart transplant when no one had ever survived long afterward and none of the recipients seemed to regain health after the transplant. I wondered if it was worth all that pain.

        Amazing how far surgeons have come since then.
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        • Profile picture of the author seasoned
          Originally Posted by Kay King View Post

          I knew kidney transplants came first (or at least thought they did) but I remember clearly my personal thoughts when heart transplants were first done.

          If you recall, there were big stories about the "successful transplants" yet the first recipients died within a few weeks or months. Considering the difficulty of exchanging a heart, not surprising.

          I used to wonder why anyone would opt for a heart transplant when no one had ever survived long afterward and none of the recipients seemed to regain health after the transplant. I wondered if it was worth all that pain.

          Amazing how far surgeons have come since then.
          It's also kind of ironic. When I was in rehab, I encountered a woman that was being TESTED for new lungs, as I recall. She had to cross this area, that was maybe 40 feet, several times, within a certain time. If she failed, she had to wait.

          The FIRST one here was the one I recalled:

          On December 3, 1967, in Capetown, South Africa, Christiaan Barnard (1922-) and a team of 30 associates performed the world's first heart transplant. In a five-hour operation, the heart of Denise Ann Darval, age 25, an auto accident victim, was transplanted into the body of Louis Washansky, a 55-year-old wholesale grocer. Washansky lived for 18 days before dying from pneumonia.

          The first heart-transplant surgery in the United States was performed just three days later, on December 6, 1967. The heart recipient was a two-week-old boy. The surgery was performed by Adrian Kantrowitz (1918 -) at Maimonides Hospital, in Brooklyn, New York. The baby died six hours after the surgery.

          The first adult to receive a heart transplant in the United States was Mike Kasperak, age 54, at the Stanford Medical Center in Palo Alto, California. Norman Shumway performed the operation...
          I didn't recall him dying of pneumonia though. 18 days is a LONG time though! The heart would have had to beat an average of maybe 1555200 times! As for the pneumonia? Well, louis was OBVIOUSLY weak and at a disadvantage. The operation had him open for 5 HOURS, and who knows HOW he was cared for. Today they have things they didn't have then, to prevent such things, and such diseases are STILL COMMON!

          BTW the first artificial heart recipient died of a BLOOD CLOT caused by the machine! That problem STILL exists today which is why people like me have to take warfarin.

          BTW they operated on ME for over 13 hours! Apparently only about 5 people really got credit for the work, as "doctors", so I don't know HOW many people overall were there. Outside of the fact that they had to cut out the aortic valve on like the surface of the heart, seal a burst layer of my aorta, and work with artificial materials, my operation would have been simpler than a heart transplant. I wonder what really slowed them down.

          Steve
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  • Profile picture of the author sarahberra
    This is so sad. I heard about this months ago. The poor guy. I am sure his brother really honors him. He really love his brother.
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    • Profile picture of the author KimW
      Originally Posted by sarahberra View Post

      This is so sad. I heard about this months ago. The poor guy. I am sure his brother really honors him. He really love his brother.
      No offense, but it happened Monday, how did you hear about it months ago??
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