A woman in her 20s received a double-lung transplant last week after the coronavirus damaged her respiratory system, Northwestern Medicine in Chicago.
The woman spent 6 weeks in the hospital’s COVID ICU on a ventilator and life support. In early June, her lungs developed irreversible damage, and she was listed for a double transplant. Within 48 hours, the team was able to perform the procedure.
“A lung transplant was her only chance for survival,” Ankit Bharat, MD, chief of thoracic surgery and surgical director of the hospital’s lung transplant program, said in the news release. Organ transplants may become more common in severe cases of COVID-19, Ankit Bharat. The coronavirus affects the lungs most often, but it can also damage the heart, kidneys, blood vessels, and nervous system.
“We want other transplant centres to know that while the transplant procedure in these patients is quite technically challenging, it can be done safely,” he said. “It offers the terminally ill COVID-19 patients another option for survival.” The patient tested negative for COVID-19 before she was placed on the transplant list.