First successful pig lung transplant for brain-dead person

pig lungs - Photo 1.

Doctors perform lung transplant surgery using genetically modified pigs for brain-dead patient in China - Photo: NATURE MEDICINE

Chinese surgeons have transplanted genetically modified pig lungs into a 39-year-old brain-dead man for the first time, the Guardian reported on August 25. The lungs functioned normally for 216 hours, or nine days, and there was no acute rejection – a rapid and violent immune response from the recipient – or infection .

However, 24 hours after the transplant, the lungs showed signs of fluid accumulation and damage, which may initially have been due to inflammation due to the transplant. The research team determined that this damage was not significant because the patient still had one of their own lungs to compensate for the damage to the transplanted pig lungs.

Professor Peter Friend, who works at the University of Oxford (UK) and is not involved in the research, said that brain death itself causes acute inflammation. Therefore, inflammation and lung damage in pigs after transplantation may be related to the patient's brain death.

Allografting is particularly difficult because every breath you take brings the outside environment into the body. This requires lungs that are highly resistant to pollutants, infections, and other sources.

"For our team, this achievement is a meaningful start. Allogeneic lung transplantation poses different biological and technical challenges compared to other organ transplantation," said Dr. Jiang Shi, co-author of the study and working at the First Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University (China).

The team's goal is to learn how the human immune system responds to an allogeneic lung transplant.

This work is considered the latest step in xenotransplantation techniques aimed at solving the current organ shortage crisis. According to the World Health Organization, the current number of donated organs only meets 10% of the global need for organ transplants.

However, experts stress that much work remains to be done before genetically modified pig lungs can be transplanted into patients who need them.

The team also said that improvements to this approach are needed, including optimizing immunosuppressive therapy, refining genetic modifications, enhancing lung preservation strategies, and assessing long-term graft function beyond the acute phase.

The study was published in the journal Nature Medicine .

ANH THU

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/lan-dau-ghep-thanh-cong-phoi-heo-cho-nguoi-chet-nao-20250826095612992.htm