World's First Successful Pig-to-Human Xenotransplant Liver Surgery in China
TapTechNews May 24th news, the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University officially announced today that it has completed the world's first clinical xenotransplantation of pig liver to a living human.
On May 17, 2024, the team led by Professor Sun Beicheng from the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University and the team led by Professor Wei Hongjiang from Yunnan Agricultural University successfully transplanted the liver of a 10-gene edited donor pig to a 71-year-old male patient with huge right lobe liver cancer at the First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University.
According to the introduction, the patient is in good condition. Today is the seventh day after the operation. The patient has got out of bed and moved freely. No hyperacute and acute rejection reactions have been found. There is no disorder in the coagulation system, and the liver function has returned to normal. The transplanted pig liver secretes about 200 ml of golden yellow bile every day. CT and B-ultrasound confirm that the blood flow of the hepatic artery, portal vein and hepatic vein of the transplanted pig liver is completely normal.
The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University said that the success of this case of transgenic pig to living human xenotransplantation has created a precedent in transgenic pig xenotransplant liver. After retrieval, it is the world's first living human xenotransplant liver operation, and it is also the fifth living human xenotransplant organ operation in the world. It is the original innovation from 0 to 1 by Chinese scientists, indicating that the xenotransplant liver technology of Chinese scientists has stood at the forefront of the world and will become one of the most important breakthroughs in the medical field.
The success of this operation has created many miracles in the history of medicine, including formulating global standards such as how to implant the whole pig liver, the use of immunosuppressants, and the perioperative management of xenotransplant liver, making it possible for xenotransplant liver to enter the clinic and will make important contributions to human health.
TapTechNews noticed that in the past two years, the xenotransplant technology of multi-gene edited pig's异种 organs has made significant progress. There have been two cases of heart and two cases of kidney xenotransplant from pig to living human, and there is still one kidney transplant patient alive.
