A surgical team from the Fourth Military Medical University Hospital in Xi’an has successfully performed a pig kidney xenotransplant on a 69-year-old woman for the first time in Asia. Six days after the operation, the woman’s body did not reject the donor organ, and her blood biochemistry returned to normal, bigasia.ru reports.
A kidney from a genetically modified pig with several edited genes was used for the transplant. The results of the operation demonstrate the significant potential of xenotransplantation as a method for solving the problem of a shortage of donor organs. The medical team continues to closely monitor the patient’s condition, paying special attention to possible immune rejection, risks of blood clots and potential infectious complications.
This operation is of great importance for China, where about 130 million people suffer from chronic kidney disease. The number of patients with end-stage renal failure requiring emergency transplantation is constantly increasing.
