The concept of heart transplants isn’t a very old one. As records suggest, the first ever human heart transplant took place in the year 1967. The recipient was 55 year old Louis Washkansky, a wholesale grocer. He’d already suffered from progressive heart failure; and this was one last chance of saving him.
The donor was a female called Denise Ann Darvall, who succumbed to injuries sustained during an automobile accident. The surgery was conducted by Dr. Christian Barnard and a 30 member team of associates. It was conducted at the Groote Schuur Hospital in Capetown, South Africa.
A heart transplant surgery is conducted on a failing or diseased heart. The former gets replaced with a healthier heart that may be received from a donor. A donor will generally be someone who has recently succumbed to death. The decision to conduct the surgery has to be made soon after the death of the donor.
A transplant is generally seen to be a last-resort kind of thing. In the sense that, doctors will resort for a heart transplantation only when all other methods haven’t seemed to give the desired results.
The surgery that entails a heart being transplanted is definitely a major one; and is not without its set of risks. The rates of survival have, however, increased greatly ever since the first surgery that took place in 1967.
A heart transplant will only be conducted when all other doors have been tried and closed. When other methods of correcting a faulty or failing heart do not work, transplantation may be the method chosen. In the case of adults, a heart failure may be caused by the following factors -
In the case of children, a heart failure might be the direct result of a congenital heart defect of sorts.
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No single heart should be wasted and be given to someone for a new lease of his life..It is important to shed beliefs and understand the importance of donating organs after one dies..
Thanks!