News
Double lung transplant increases survival time
HealthDay News
Lung transplant patients who receive two lungs are twice as likely to live more than 10 years than patients who receive one lung are, Johns Hopkins transplant surgeons say.
“Our results suggest that double-lung transplants have a long-term advantage, and surgeons should consider bilateral lung transplants whenever possible,” senior investigator Dr. Ashish Shah, an associate professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and its Heart Institute, said in a Hopkins news release.
The finding from their analysis of patient records for all single- and double-lung transplants performed in Canada and the United States from 1987 to 1997 is potentially controversial. That’s because there’s a shortage of lung donors, and promoting more double-lung transplants could almost halve the number of potential lung recipients.
