Surgeons in the United States have transplanted a modified pig kidney into a living person for the second time, a hospital said Wednesday, celebrating an advance in animal-to-human organ transplants.
The procedure at NYU Langone Health in New York was carried out in April on Lisa Pisano, 54, who had suffered heart failure and end-stage kidney disease, with doctors giving her just weeks to live barring some kind of medical intervention.
Surgeons implanted a mechanical heart pump in Pisano days before the transplant, which NYU Langone Health said was a world-first for this combined procedure.
In addition to the gene-edited kidney, doctors also — for what the hospital said was the first time on a living patient — transplanted the pig’s thymus gland, which helps “educate” the immune system and reduce the chance of organ rejection.
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