Thursday, June 14, 2018

Canadian team reports success in transplanting hepatitis C organs

Toronto doctors safely transplant lungs from hepatitis C-infected donors
by Sheryl Ubelacker, The Canadian Press
Last Updated Jun 14, 2018 at 8:24 am EDT

Toronto doctors have successfully transplanted lungs from deceased donors with hepatitis C into patients in need of the lifesaving organs, followed by treatment to prevent them from becoming infected with the potentially liver-destroying virus.

Since October, surgeons at Toronto General Hospital have performed the transplants in 11 patients as part of a pilot study to evaluate the safety of using lungs from hepatitis C-infected donors — a previously untenable idea.

That’s because antiviral drugs can now cure the disease in 98 per cent of people infected with hepatitis C, which affects an estimated 250,000 Canadians, about 40 to 70 per cent of them unaware they harbour the blood-borne virus.

“With the opioid crisis and persistent high rates of intravenous drug use, we have a great number of potential lung donors who are hepatitis C-positive, many of whom didn’t even know they were sick when they were alive,” said Dr. Marcelo Cypel, a thoracic surgeon at TGH and principal investigator of the study.

Canadian team reports success in transplanting hepatitis C organs
WASHINGTON: A long-running shortage in donor organs has pushed doctors to find ways to use those with hepatitis C, an infection that is increasingly common in the United States due to the opioid crisis, and which can be cured with medicine.

Some US hospitals, particularly in Boston, have already transplanted infected donor organs into people without hepatitis C. These patients are swiftly treated with drugs to eliminate the virus.

In Toronto, Canada, another team of doctors on Thursday announced early results from a trial using a different technique, involving 10 people who received lung transplants from donors with hepatitis C.

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