“Griffith had transplanted pig hearts into about 50 baboons over five years, before offering the option to Bennett.” I wonder how the baboons did.
I imagine at least the later ones did well enough to give Griffith some confidence in his methods.
U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
161–170 of 731 posts
Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not necessarily. Life expectancy is affected by the most mortal part of your species: it might be that pigs’ hearts are fine, but they’re prone to cancers after a certain age.
Then could they yeet the old one into the sausage grinder and transplant a fresh one. It could even be a nice 12 year ritual, pay 1 million dollars for the most expensive sausage you'll ever eat. http://www.culinarypen.com/2014/02/pork-heart-sausage.html?m...
If you eat that heart, would it make you a cannibal? The heart cells are replaced every 3 years? Is that a human heart now, with a pig foundation?
Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#163You might be asking, why a pig? I don't know, but forever ago I wrote software for a cardiovascular imaging lab and pigs were their primary test subjects. I was like, "why pigs?" and the PI was like, "Imaging-wise, pig hearts aren't too different from humans. Plus, we can give them a heart attack in the scanner and not go to jail. Some labs use dogs. I just can't do that."
Pigs are really common in biomedical testing. They are physically a similar size and weight to humans. They also reach maturity in about 6 months. Much cheaper to raise than primates, and more likely to get approval for testing. My friends in biomed grad school named one of theirs cyber pig because it has about 30 different experiments ran on it before it was killed, and afterwards it was portioned out for further te…
Bit of a tangent: I read the article to my wife and she mentioned that there is an episode of Grey's Anatomy where they wanted to perform a transplant of a pig's bowels but the Jewish (or Muslim?) lady refused. Interesting how one might choose to their faith over their life.
Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#164Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
Pigs are really common in biomedical testing. They are physically a similar size and weight to humans. They also reach maturity in about 6 months. Much cheaper to raise than primates, and more likely to get approval for testing. My friends in biomed grad school named one of theirs cyber pig because it has about 30 different experiments ran on it before it was killed, and afterwards it was portioned out for further te…
How do you make sure all those experiments don't interfere with eachother?
You can’t really. You test in naive animals when critical, but repeating an experiment or needing a quick binary read-out, you can use non-naive successfully.
Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
In addition to soft flexible machinery being somewhat difficult to manufacture, you would also have to hook it up to the brain. Not exactly an easy feat.
Why would you need to hook it up to the brain? I am assuming to respond to signals, for example stressed -> beat faster? But what would happen if you didn't have this automatic response? Let's say the heartbeat could be controlled by an algorithm or an app - for example if you lie down, it slows down automatically or if you expect to do some exercise, you can turn it up.
I'm fairly certain you don't want your heart controlled by an app on your phone.
Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#167Can I live forever by transplanting various pig organs to my failing organs?
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Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#168One step closer to Porkin' Across America irl
Possibly the most underrated web series of all time
Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
Pigs are really common in biomedical testing. They are physically a similar size and weight to humans. They also reach maturity in about 6 months. Much cheaper to raise than primates, and more likely to get approval for testing. My friends in biomed grad school named one of theirs cyber pig because it has about 30 different experiments ran on it before it was killed, and afterwards it was portioned out for further te…
Are pigs used in biomedical testing ever butchered for their meat? Seems like we kill a lot of pigs every year anyways. Would be neat if we could get multiple birds from one stone - for experiments where there isn't a risk of making the meat dangerous at least.
I doubt it. All disposed of according to hazardous waste rules. Also, large study animals are so important that most tissues and bits are studied during necropsy in close details with retained material kept frozen for years.
Re: U.S. surgeons transplant pig heart into human patient
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd argue that in islam pretty much all of these restrictions are not applicable when it's for medical reasons. Alcohol is explicitly allowed in such cases (I think it was used to relieve pain in surgeries) , and even pork is okay to eat if you can't find anything else. Another example would be Ramadan fasting, which is not necessary if you are ill or when you are travelin. Overall, almost any restriction in islam is…
You can rationalize all you want, but you can't reason religious people out of things they didn't reason themselves into. If these people can be convinced that they shouldn't be doing thing XYZ on the order of an omnipotent being that nobody has ever seen, chances seem to be even between them accepting exceptions from this order and them rejecting these exceptions. After all, you see other people rejecting/ignoring o…
> reason religious people out of things they didn't reason themselves into.
Please don't presume things about religious people, especially since you're not one yourself.