Northwestern Medicine performs record number of transplants with new "lungs in a box" technology
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Northwestern Medicine is celebrating a milestone after performing a record number of lung transplants using new technology known as "lungs in a box."
The procedure allows surgeons to remove lungs from a donor body, attach them to a ventilator, and make them usable for transplant by treating any infection, inflammation, or edema, before storing them in a refrigerator.
Previously, surgeons only had six hours to take lungs out of a donor, fly them to Northwestern, and get them into the patient.
Now, with the "lungs in a box" procedure, surgeons can store donor lungs for up to 12 hours, allowing doctors more flexibility and perform transplants during normal working hours.
Dr. Ankit Bharat, chief of thoracic surgery and director of the Northwestern Medicine Canning Thoracic Institute, said it leads to better outcomes for patients.
"All the outcomes, all of the recipients have done really well, and in fact the early experience that we have, patients are doing actually even better than what we've seen in the past," Bharat said.
Last year, surgeons performed 148 lung transplants on patients from around the world, the most in a single year since the hospital's lung transplant program began 10 years ago. It's also the first time Northwestern became the highest-volume lung transplant center in the U.S.
