AmericaThe world’s first person to receive a pig kidney transplant has been discharged from the hospital in “the best health ever seen,” according to Massachusetts General Hospital doctors.
Rick Slayman, 62 years old, had surgery to transplant a genetically modified pig kidney at Massachusetts General Hospital on March 16. After a period of hospitalization for monitoring and treatment, doctors said his health was good enough to return home.
“The moment I left the hospital today, I felt better than ever. This is what I have wished for for many years, one of the happiest times in my life,” Mr. Slayman said, on April 4. He also thanked the medical staff for taking good care of him.
According to doctors, Slayman’s kidney produced urine immediately after the four-hour surgery. Currently, this part works normally, so he no longer needs dialysis.
This is Slayman’s second kidney transplant. Because he had type 2 diabetes for many years, he received an organ transplant from a donor in 2018, after 7 years of dialysis.
Five years later, the transplanted kidney began to fail, and he continued to have to undergo hemodialysis. Complications from this cause patients to be hospitalized approximately every two weeks. Therefore, he volunteered for a pig kidney transplant.
Slayman said he especially trusts doctors and Massachusetts General Hospital. He is also especially happy to be able to continue accompanying his family, friends and loved ones, escaping the many years of dialysis that affected his life.
According to experts, the above surgery is an important medical milestone. “To finally have this come to fruition after many years of work is truly a huge step forward,” said Dr. Parsia Vagefi, chief of transplant surgery at UT Southwestern Medical Center.
Currently, the demand for organs exceeds the quantity in the reserve. Every day, 17 people in the United States die while waiting for transplant surgery. Kidneys are the type of organ with the least supply. According to the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network, about 27,000 kidneys have been transplanted by 2023. However, there are still 89,000 people on the waiting list.
This is the third pig organ transplant into a living person. Previously, doctors performed two pig heart transplants to humans, but the patients died after a few months because the transplanted heart was infected with a pig virus.