Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 241 posts

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#121

Post by bradly »

heyoni wrote: post #16
slowhand09 wrote: post #5

My friend was a member of the transplant team at Johns Hopkins. "They" said he was near multiple organ failure prior to the transplant. And he survived significantly longer than expected. Recovery under those circumstances was a very long shot already. Kudos to him for undergoing the procedure, and furthering the research. Condolences to he and his family.

Which is probably how they got approval to do a pig heart transplant in the first place since he would never get on the transplant list.

I have an uncle in his sixties that has drank and smoked his whole life and he has been on heart and liver transplant list for about a year. Because he continued to live unhealthily his heart started failing this week with multiple heart attacks they moved him to level one priority and he will likely get his transplants this week. It feels weird that he is now ahead of others because they tried to be healthy and he did not.

Similarly a friend work for Alabamas football program and he couldn’t travel with the team to games in 2020 because he _hadn’t_ had Covid, while those who had gotten Covid could travel.

Basically… it’s hard to formulate rules for these sort of things and rarely are they “fair” to all involved.

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#122

Post by foota »

rmellow wrote: post #47
testesttest wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A test in the US < $50 and is easy to schedule without having a doctor involved at LabCore or similar. Is that an option in CA?

There are private clinics one can become a member of, but this is extremely uncommon and most people don't know it's an option. Costs upwards of $3,000 annually.

Only 3,000? chuckles in American

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#123

Post by sonicggg »

majormajor wrote: post #119
sonicggg wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure about that aspect either. They invested a boatload of money into a guy that can't even make a 1-year follow-up. How are they supposed to observe the transplant long term?

Why are you so concerned about being able to observe it long-term when prior to this it had never even been able to be observed short term ? Do you think they should be doing this on a bunch of healthy people to "learn more"? Like you think there will be volunteers? Or do you think it's simply impossible and shouldn't have been done at all? Or are you just being contrary to be contrary?

Healthy people? Well, it's not like it's "raining organs" for people on a waiting list. Many of them will die waiting. There must be someone on a slight better shape and willing to take a chance.

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#124

Post by fortran77 »

dheera wrote: post #95
slowhand09 wrote: post #5

My friend was a member of the transplant team at Johns Hopkins. "They" said he was near multiple organ failure prior to the transplant. And he survived significantly longer than expected. Recovery under those circumstances was a very long shot already. Kudos to him for undergoing the procedure, and furthering the research. Condolences to he and his family.

Well also, condolences to Edward Shumaker, who he murdered, and Edward's family. [0] [0] https://www.wionews.com/world/patient-in-ground-breaking-hea...

And the pig.

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#125

Post by elliekelly »

diego_sandoval wrote: post #100
phkahler wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that really raises the question of what did he die from? If not from the heart, how do they proceed with the research? Gotta do the next one on a person whose not already nearly gone. That seems like a highly sensitive line, no doubt it's a big discussion to move it.

My uneducated guess: If he had survived for a long time, we would have known that it worked. He didn't survive, so we didn't learn much. If we try with enough people who are as critical as him, eventually one could survive and we would know that the procedure works for at least some people.

I believe he surpassed several important “milestones” for a transplant patient so his death doesn’t mean the surgery was unsuccessful by any means. And even if it was a total “failure” of a surgery and the patient died on the table that doesn’t mean the team “didn’t learn much”. Not by a long shot.

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#126

Post by elliekelly »

dheera wrote: post #95
slowhand09 wrote: post #5

My friend was a member of the transplant team at Johns Hopkins. "They" said he was near multiple organ failure prior to the transplant. And he survived significantly longer than expected. Recovery under those circumstances was a very long shot already. Kudos to him for undergoing the procedure, and furthering the research. Condolences to he and his family.

Well also, condolences to Edward Shumaker, who he murdered, and Edward's family. [0] [0] https://www.wionews.com/world/patient-in-ground-breaking-hea...

His assault definitely contributed to Shumaker’s early death but he didn’t “murder” him.

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#127

Post by elliekelly »

harles wrote: post #104
sonicggg wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Choosing a guy next to his deathbed is not the greatest PR move. People will associate the death to the transplant.

I’m glad this team was more concerned about science and minimizing risk than PR. Hopefully negative press doesn’t cause much of a hinderance.

How is this negative press? This transplant was a huge success.

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#128

Post by magicalhippo »

Jabbles wrote: post #84
phkahler wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that really raises the question of what did he die from? If not from the heart, how do they proceed with the research? Gotta do the next one on a person whose not already nearly gone. That seems like a highly sensitive line, no doubt it's a big discussion to move it.

"What people die of" seems like the sort of question the medical community should be quite good at answering. People are waiting for human heart transplants and dying from the wait. I don't think there will be a shortage of patients who we can ethically treat whilst researching this new technique. It certainly isn't binary with a hard "sensitive line".

> "What people die of" seems like the sort of question the medical community should be quite good at answering.

Yes and no, I think.

Technically my dad died of asphyxia. His cancer had spread to his lungs, he'd gotten pneumonia and was in hospital on oxygen. The doctors were clear he wouldn't be going home in the months he potentially had left. So he asked to be disconnected from the oxygen and he died an hour later.

So did he really die of asphyxia? Was it pneumonia, or the cancer? Clearly they were contributing factors, but in the end it was his decision to stop the oxygen, so as such was it suicide?

To me it doesn't really matter. He's gone and I'm just glad he didn't have to hang on to the bitter end.

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#129

Post by jtbayly »

data_acquired wrote: post #98
gpm wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "What people die of" seems like the sort of question the medical community should be quite good at answering. Does it? I'm definitely not a doctor, but it seems like a very difficult question to answer. Even with perfect information, it seems unlikely there is always a simple/single answer. I would naively expect things like (and I'm making a bit up here, because I'm really not a doctor) "not enough oxygen reached…

One of Atul Gawande's books (Complications) mentions that amongst deaths where an autopsy is done, the cause of death was misdiagnosed by the doctor about 40% of the time. Quote from book [Page 197, Chapter name : "Final Cut"] --- "How often do autopsies turn up a major misdiagnosis in the cause of death? I would have guessed this happened rarely, in 1 or 2 percent of cases at most. According to three studies done in…

Perhaps autopsies are much more likely if the doctor is unsure of the cause?

Re: Man given genetically modified pig heart dies

#130

Post by judge2020 »

bradly wrote: post #121
heyoni wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is probably how they got approval to do a pig heart transplant in the first place since he would never get on the transplant list.

I have an uncle in his sixties that has drank and smoked his whole life and he has been on heart and liver transplant list for about a year. Because he continued to live unhealthily his heart started failing this week with multiple heart attacks they moved him to level one priority and he will likely get his transplants this week. It feels weird that he is now ahead of others because they tried to be healthy and he d…

I thought that hospitals specifically only put you on the list if you committed to a healthy lifestyle.
Post reply on HN