In an encouraging step for the growing medical field, doctors at NYU Langone Health performed the first pig heart transplant into a brain dead patient.
The transplant will take place on July 6.
The hearts exhibited normal heart function in the days after the surgeries.
The NYU Langone Transplant Institute hopes to conduct clinical trials using the organs in the future, according to a statement from the surgical director.
The study was funded by Revivicor.
Genetically modified pig organs have become a topic of interest and research in recent years. In September of last year, teams at NYU Langone Health and the University of Alabama-Birmingham performed the world's first transplant of pig kidneys into brain dead humans. David Bennett, the first living person to receive a heart from a genetically modified pig, passed away in March. Bennett died of heart failure caused by a complex array of factors, according to researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
Robert Montgomery, director of the NYU Langone Transplant Institute, said in a statement that the study's purpose is to address the organ shortage and provide another option for the more than 100,000 people nationwide waiting on that lifesaver.
Doctors have plans to scale up after successfully transplanting a pigKidney.
The testing for pig organ transplants is getting closer.
A man gets a new heart from a genetically modified pig.
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