A 57-year-old man with terminal heart disease who made history as the first person to receive a genetically modified pig’s heart died at the University of Maryland Medical Center (UMMC), as per hospital.
David Bennett receive the transplant on 7th January 2022.
As David Bennett condition began deteriorating many days ago, the hospital said in a statement, and he was given “compassionate palliative care” after it became clear that he would not recover.
David Bennett “wasn’t able to overcome what turn out to be the devastating debilitation” cause by the heart failure he experience before the transplant, Dr. Bartley Griffith, director of the UMCC cardiac transplant program, said in a videotaped statement.
Dr. Bartley Griffith Said :
The transplanted heart function “beautifully,”.
David Bennett was able to communicate with his family during his final hours, as per hospital.
David Bennett first came to UMMC as a patient in October and was place on a heart-lung bypass machine, but was deem ineligible for a conventional heart transplant.
After David Bennett receive a pig heart that had modified to prevent rejection with the use of new gene editing tools, his son called the procedure “a miracle.”
For David Bennett, the procedure was his last option.
Hospital Said :
“Before consenting to receive the transplant, Mr. Bennett was fully informed of the procedure’s risks, and that the procedure was experimental with unknown risks and benefits,”.
Researchers have long consider pigs to be a potential source of organs for transplants because they are anatomically similar to humans in many ways.
Prior efforts at pig-to-human transplants had fail because of genetic differences that cause organ rejection or viruses that pose an infection risk.
Dr. Bartley Griffith Said :
“The demonstration that it was possible – that we were able to take a genetically engineered organ and watch it function flawlessly for nine weeks, is pretty positive in terms of the potential for this therapy,”.
