A 42-year-old father spent months in the hospital near death as he battled COVID-19. A double lung transplant saved his life. Carter Evans has the story.
Watch the full interview here.
COVID destroyed his lungs. Transplants arrived just in time.
Organ donations held almost steady during the pandemic, as the U.S. transplant system scrambled to keep going
“This is not a pandemic “silver lining” story.
This is a could-have-been-far-worse story about how the pandemic did not fuel a catastrophe in transplantation or worsen the persistent gap between people who need organs and the donations that supply them. But just as the pandemic is not over yet, neither is the potential danger of related ramifications for people whose organs may fail and need replacement.
Covid-19’s first surge last year flooded hospitals in the United States and nearly drowned those in the Northeast. They couldn’t find enough personal protective equipment for beleaguered workers, they didn’t yet have reliable testing for patients or staff, and they couldn’t know when the nightmare might end. Within that maelstrom, many transplants had to be put on hold: How do you perform life-saving operations when the supply of already scarce donor organs nose-dives?”
Read more, here.
Monoclonal Antibodies Safe for Organ Recipients with Covid-19
Solid organ transplant recipients with mild-to-moderate Covid-19 can be safely treated with monoclonal antibody therapy, a new study confirmed.
Researchers at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, reported that monoclonal antibody treatment was associated with favorable outcomes with minimal side effects in the first solid organ transplant patients to receive the infusions for Covid-19 at their center.
None of the 73 patients died, required mechanical ventilation, or experienced organ rejection.
Eleven of the patients (15%) had emergency department visits within 28 days of monoclonal antibody infusion, including 9 who were hospitalized for a median of 4 days. Just one patient required ICU admission for a non-Covid-19 indication.
Read more, here.
Transplant Hospitals Fight New Formula for Allocating Kidneys
A second federal appeals court is wading into a long-running dispute over how best to allocate organs from deceased donors.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit will hear arguments June 17 over a policy change in how kidneys are distributed. Transplant candidates within a 250 nautical-mile circle around a donor’s hospital now get priority. Before the change took effect March 15, kidneys were allocated based on geographic boundaries that roughly followed state lines.
The United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS), which coordinates organ donations and transplants, argues its fixed circle policy aims to make organ allocations more equitable for everyone, particularly in areas like New York City where the demand is greater than the supply.
However, six transplant hospitals and a patient waiting for a kidney want the policy blocked by a federal appeals court. They argue it was rushed through without proper notice and comment, and will result in fewer transplants every year.
Read more, here.
Doctor starts program to close the gap for Black organ transplant patients
Studies show that 26 percent of Black patients waiting for an organ receive one and the number is nearly double for white patients. Dr. Dinee Simpson is one of 10 Black, female transplant surgeons practicing in the U.S. She started the first and only program in the country that helps African Americans receive organs.
Read more and watch the interview, here.
Your Healthy Family: Lung Transplants Increased for COVID-19 Patients During the Pandemic
Hospitals across the country have reported a rise in lung transplants for patients with severe cases of COVID-19, and that’s created new challenges for doctors along the way.
“COVID-19 has really struck the transplant community in a very unique way, from the donor side of things to the recipient side of things. So we’ve had to think about the donors that we are taking to transplant. And for a while there, we thought donor activity would actually become an issue and that we wouldn’t have enough donors,” said Marie Budev, MD, medical director of lung transplantation for Cleveland Clinic.
Read more, here.
Levine Children’s pediatric heart transplant program hits milestone
After more than 100 transplants, the pediatric heart team in Charlotte says they can keep families together for tough battles.
When a child needs a heart transplant, there’s a lot to factor in. But the team at Atrium Health Levine Children’s Hospital in Charlotte says they’re equipped to provide the best care possible for kids in the region, and they say they can keep families closer to home for care.
During a panel on Facebook Live on Thursday, four members of the Pediatric Heart Surgery and Cardiology team discussed what they do to help ensure kids who need a heart transplant not only can get one but also are able to recover quickly and have continuing care that lasts until adulthood. Dr. Gonzalo Wallis, one of the experts on the panel, notes the program at Charlotte is not only the only one in the region but nationally-ranked and fully equipped to handle anything. Wallis was especially grateful for a generous donation from former Carolina Panther Greg Olsen and his wife Carol; one of their sons, TJ, was born with congenital heart disease, prompting them to help the program out.
Read the full story, here.
A 3rd Dose Of COVID Vaccines May Boost Immunity For Transplant Recipients
A small new study offers a glimmer of hope that giving organ transplant recipients a third dose of the COVID-19 vaccine could boost their protection against the coronavirus.
That’s important because prior research has shown that nearly half of organ transplant recipients failed to show any antibody response even after two doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine.
And even in transplant recipients who showed an antibody response to vaccination, that response was often more muted than in people with healthy immune systems. That has led doctors to advise these patients not to assume that vaccination equals immunity. More than 400,000 people in the U.S. are living with organ transplants, according to the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients.
Read more, here.
Bezlotoxumab Reduces Odds of Recurrent C Difficile for Organ Transplant Recipients
New research shows bezlotoxumab is effective at reducing the risk of recurrent Clostridioides difficile infections (CDI) at the 90 day mark in a cohort of patients recently receiving solid-organ transplantation.
A team, led by Tanner M. Johnson, Department of Pharmacy, UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital, compared recurrent C difficile infection rates in solid-organ and hematopoietic-cell transplant recipients.
Read more, here.
Implant reverses type 1 diabetes in mice by delivering beta cells
Some of the most favorable alternative sources for diabetes cell replacement therapy are human stem cells. However, a critical challenge has been finding a safe, effective means to introduce replacement cells that normalize blood sugar levels without triggering the body’s natural immune response.
Researchers at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, MO, and Cornell University in Ithaca, NY, have collaborated to develop a tiny implant that successfully delivers insulin-secreting cells, or beta cells, into mice with diabetes, without the need for immunosuppressive drug treatment.
Read more, here.