Second Maryland man to receive an altered pig heart has died
A 58-year-old man with heart failure who received a new heart from a genetically modified pig died Monday, nearly six weeks after receiving the pig organ, University of Maryland Medical Center officials announced Tuesday.
Lawrence Faucette, of Frederick, Maryland, was the second patient at the medical center to have a diseased heart replaced with a pig heart that had been genetically modified so that the organs would be more compatible with a human recipient and would not be rejected . by the human immune system.
The first patient, 57-year-old David Bennett, died last year, two months after his transplant. He had developed several complications and traces of a virus that infects pigs were found in his new heart.
Both patients had terminal heart disease when they received the transplanted organs, and neither managed to recover enough to leave the hospital. But while doctors said Mr. Bennett showed no signs of acute rejection of the new heart, which is the biggest risk in organ transplants, they said Mr. Faucette’s transplanted heart had begun to show some early signs of rejection.
“We mourn the loss of Mr. Faucette, a remarkable patient, scientist, Navy veteran and family man, who simply wanted to spend some more time with his loving wife, sons and family,” said Dr. Bartley P. Griffith, the surgeon who performed the transplant at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore.
Mr. Faucette was deeply involved in his own care and read and interpreted his own biopsies, said Dr. Muhammad M. Mohiuddin, professor of surgery and scientific program director of the cardiac xenotransplantation program at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
“Mr. Faucette’s dying wish was that we make the most of what we learned from our experience so that others are guaranteed a chance at a new heart when a human organ is unavailable,” Dr. Griffith said.
After the surgery, the transplanted heart performed well, with no signs of rejection for the first month, and Mr. Faucette was able to undergo physical therapy with the goal of regaining his ability to walk, according to a statement from the University of Maryland.
Like Mr. Bennett, the first patient to receive a pig heart, Mr. Faucette was rejected from transplant programs that used a traditional organ from a deceased human donor. He was too ill and suffered from advanced heart failure, peripheral vascular disease and other complications.
He was in end-stage heart failure on September 14 when he was admitted to the University of Maryland Medical Center. Shortly before the operation, his heart stopped and he had to be resuscitated.
His wife, Ann Faucette, said at the time that the couple kept expectations low and were just hoping for a little more time to “sit on the porch” and have coffee together.
After his death, Mrs. Faucette said her husband was a kind and selfless man who hoped his experience would help save lives by advancing the field of xenotransplantation, or the transplantation of organs or tissues from an animal source into a human recipient.
“He knew his time with us was short, and this was his last chance to do something for others,” she said in a statement.
Transplant surgeons at a number of medical centers have worked fervently to advance the field of xenotransplantation. Most of the work to date has involved transplanting kidneys from genetically modified pigs into brain-dead patients kept on ventilators, to demonstrate that the kidneys can make urine and perform other essential biological functions without being rejected.
More than 100,000 Americans are living with end-stage organ disease, and there is an acute shortage of human donor organs. Most people waiting for an organ need a kidney, but fewer than 25,000 kidney transplants are performed each year and thousands die while on the waiting list.