Swedish doctors have pioneered a technique that could dramatically increase the number of lungs available for transplant and save the lives of many who would otherwise die waiting for a donor. The method, which involves injecting a coolant into the lungs after the heart has stopped beating, enabled lungs from a dead donor to be transplanted for the first time. It was described this week in The Lancet medical journal.
Organs start to deteriorate as soon as the heart stops beating.
But scientists have recently discovered that the lungs have a unique ability to maintain themselves for about an hour after the heart stops beating because they fill with blood saturated with oxygen and the airways fill with air. The man's lungs were injected through the chest with a coolant 65 minutes after he died. The cooling extends the ability of the lungs to survive for at least another 12 hours, Steen said. The lungs were removed after three hours. The recipient has so far survived for five months.