A rare transplant leaves a man with two hearts
February 24th, 2011 - 3:09 am ICT by Aishwarya BhattSan Diego, Feb 23 (THAINDIAN NEWS) A California man can boast of two hearts after doctors performed a procedure on him to add a healthy heart to his defective one.
36-year-old Tyson Smith was born with a heart condition that caused his heart to swell over the period. His heart had enlarged so much in the past that the doctors had no option but to get him a new heart. When he was rushed to the hospital emergency ward doctors realized that conventional heart transplant would be impossible because of the man’s high blood pressure and heart condition.
Dr Jack Copeland who led the team to work on Smith said that, “You grow into it and as you get older your heart just gets bigger and bigger and as the heart gets bigger it can’t pump as effectively.”
The doctors performed a very rare procedure to save his life. The procedure called heterotopic heart transplant is used to join two hearts and allow them to work in sync. That was what the doctors did. Smith is now walking around with two hearts and he feels very lucky for that.
The heart condition runs through the family of Smith.
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Tags: california man, doctors, dr jack, emergency ward, healthy heart, heart condition, heart transplant, high blood pressure, hospital emergency, jack copeland, man with two hearts, new heart, rare procedure, san diego, sync, tyson