Novel Procedure Could Change Future of Transplant | Duke Health

Easton Sinnamon is thriving after the world’s first combination heart transplant and thymus procedure which could lower the risk of organ rejection. The two procedures -- performed at Duke University Hospital last summer under an expanded access application that was cleared by the FDA -- represent a milestone in heart transplantation.
“This has the potential to change the face of solid organ transplantation in the future,” said Joseph W. Turek, M.D., Ph.D., Duke’s chief of pediatric cardiac surgery and a member of the surgical team that performed the landmark procedure.
Currently, transplanted hearts have an average lifespan of about 10 to 15 years. With durability limited by the toxicity of immune-suppression drugs, other options have long been sought.
The processed thymus tissue implantation method, pioneered at Duke by Louise Markert, M.D., uses a proprietary technique to culture and administer processed thymus tissue; the process has been licensed to Enzyvant Therapeutics GmbH.
Read more about the procedure & the surgical team that made it possible: duke.is/v3g4g
#ThymusTransplant | #HeartTransplant | #Enzyvant | #PediatricCardiacSurgery| #DukeSurgery | #DukeHeartCenter | #DukeCTSurgery | #DukeSchoolofMedicine | #DukeUniversityHospital