Rare Surgery In US: Indian-Origin Doctor Performs Double Lung Transplant For COVID-19 Patient

Chicago: Believed to be the first of its kind in the US, an Indian-origin doctor in the US, led a team of surgeons gave a new set of lungs to a young woman with severe lung damage from coronavirus.  

According to Northwestern Medicine in Chicago, the recipient is a Hispanic woman in her 20s.

The patient was on a ventilator and heart-lung machine for almost two months before her operation at Northwestern Memorial Hospital.

The 10-hour procedure had left her lungs full of holes and almost fused to the chest wall, said Dr. Ankit Bharat, who performed the operation.

Although the patient is still on a ventilator, she is well enough to visit with family via phone video and doctors say her chances for a normal life are good.

The median life of a double-lung transplant is about nine years before the organs must be replaced, but experts have seen transplanted lungs function much longer, Dr. Bharat said.