Heart Transplantation in Childhood

Introduction

The first pediatric heart transplant was performed by Kantrowitz and colleagues who, in 1967 – only 3 days after Dr. Barnard's accomplishment – transplanted the heart of an anencephalic infant into a 3-week-old with tricuspid atresia [1]. More than 40 years later, the 10th official pediatric heart transplantation (Tx) report-2007 of the registry of the International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation (ISHLT) documents data over the past 25 years by era of transplantation [2]. We review data from this publication focussing on volumes, indications and outcomes and report survival data of pediatric heart transplant recipients from Stanford.

References

• 1 Kantrowitz A, Haller J D, Joos H, Cerruti M M, Carstensen H E. Transplantation of the heart in an infant and an adult.  Am J Cardiol. 1968;  22 782-790
• 2 Boucek M M, Aurora P, Edwards L B, Taylor D O, Trulock E P, Christie J, Dobbels F, Rahmel A O, Keck B M, Hertz M I. Registry of the International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation: tenth official pediatric heart transplantation report – 2007.  J Heart Lung Transplant. 2007;  26 796-807