Rare Operation Saves Two Babies

Two babies in Ohio are recovering from a rare and remarkable life-saving operation known as a domino transplant.

The last time doctors tried the operation in this country was nearly a decade ago. Andrea Cambern from CBS News affiliate WBNS in Columbus, Ohio

The operation involved two babies in the same intensive care unit at the Columbus Children's Hospital. One needed a new heart the size of a walnut. The other needed new lungs the size of butterfly wings.

Four-month-old Jason Wolfe had developed pulmonary hypertension. His lungs were dying.

"We thought we were going to lose our son and we told the doctors at the time that, you know, if anything happened to him, we wanted him to be an organ donor, you know, to help somebody else out," said Mike Wolfe, Jason's father.

Kayla Richardson, age three months, was born six weeks prematurely. The right side of her heart didn't develop properly. She was put on a heart-lung machine to keep her alive.

Both sets of parents were told their children would die without a transplant.

"We're a spiritual couple and we pray a lot, but we didn't know how to pray for that because it would mean that someone's child would have to pass for our child to survive," said Robert Richardson, Kayla's father.

Mark Galantowicz, director of cardiopulmonary transplants the hospital, had an idea. He thought it might be possible to do a rare domino transplant. Friday, Jan. 13 was the lucky day. A set of heart and lungs, the right size and blood type, became available in another state.

The plan was to give Jason the donated heart and lungs and to transplant Jason's healthy heart to Kayla.

"It has to happen that two people were waiting at the same time within the same institution," said Timothy Hoffman, heart transplant director at the hospital.

Because these circumstances are so rare, an operation of this type hasn't happened in nearly a decade.

"This is the first domino transplant that's been performed in the United States in any age group since 1996," said Todd Astor, lung transplantation medical director.

That last procedure was performed on adults in New York, according to Cambern. On babies, there is even less room for error.

"These operations are very precise. And there is the potential for mistakes, or things not being perfect. But you want them to be perfect. You need them to be perfect. These are your kids for the moment," said Galantowicz.

The surgical procedures on Jason and Kayla took about 12 hours to complete. They were performed in side-by-side operating rooms by two separate transplant teams.

For now, Cambern reports that both babies are doing well and may go home within a week or two.