Heart Transplantation Program
UPMC’s Heart Transplantation Program is one of the few programs nationwide to have performed more than 1,000 cardiac transplants and 900 lung or heart-lung transplants. This experience helped UPMC lead the nation in lung and heart-lung transplants in 2005. More than 40 heart and heart-lung transplantations are done each year, with the greatest post-transplantation longevity among UPMC recipients now approaching 20 years.
The UPMC program focuses resources on clinical care as well as basic and translational clinical research in both transplantation and surgical treatment of heart failure, thus allowing clinicians to optimize therapy and outcomes for individual patients. In a continuing effort to improve outcomes following transplantation, UPMC faculty members remain pioneers in novel immunosuppression strategies to diminish the morbidity associated with immunosuppressive therapy. This allows them to further extend UPMC's recipient criteria, thus offering better outcomes to a greater number of patients in need. UPMC also continues to be the national leader in multivisceral transplants, with five-year survival statistics that compare quite favorably to national benchmarks. In addition, UPMC continues to accept unusually complex cases.
| UPMC's Heart Transplant Volumes |
|
Heart |
Lung and
Heart-Lung |
| 2008 |
46 |
127 |
| 2007 |
55 |
130 |
| 2006 |
71 |
104 |
| 2005 |
45 |
96 |
| 2004 |
47 |
66 |
| 2003 |
44 |
46 |
| 2002 |
54 |
51 |
| 2001 |
42 |
60 |
| Source: UNOS |