'Dead' Hearts Could Be 'Reanimated' and Transplanted, Scientists Claim

A new method that may significantly increase the donor base for heart transplants has been discovered by scientists.

The majority of heart transplants today come from donors who are brain-dead but whose hearts still beat. However, a group of researchers has suggested that hearts from people who suffered a circulatory death (i.e. whose heart stopped beating) could also be used for transplantation.

While doctors may be wary of hearts donated after circulatory death due to concerns that this delicate organ might have sustained damage during the time it was deprived of oxygen, the researchers argued that such hearts can be kept on “life support” via a special machine until transplantation.

The research involved 180 people at various US hospitals: half of these patients received heart transplants from brain-dead donors while the other half got heart transplants donated after circulatory death.

The results of the study, published in The New England Journal of Medicine last week, stated that the “risk-adjusted 6-month survival” was 94 percent among the recipients of heart transplants from circulatory death donors and 90 percent among those who received heart transplants from brain-dead donors.

Commenting on this development, transplant cardiologist Dr. Nancy Sweitzer from Washington University in St. Louis, who was not involved in this study, told one media outlet that the researchers’ findings show “the potential to increase fairness and equity in heart transplantation, allowing more persons with heart failure to have access to this lifesaving therapy.”