The heart is the power of human blood circulation, and human life can not be separated from the beating heart at any time. If the heart is damaged by the disease to the point where it can no longer work, all kinds of treatment measures are useless. Can the patient be replaced with a healthy heart? The achievement of modern medicine-heart transplantation, has answered this question. 1967 12.3 in a hospital in cape town, south Africa, a 30-person surgical team headed by professor Barnard transplanted a heart for a 55-year-old patient, which became the first practical example of heart transplantation in clinic. But the patient died on February 2 1 day of the same year. Since then, more than 400 patients with end-stage heart disease have been transplanted in 64 medical centers in 22 countries, but few people have achieved long-term survival. 1April, 978, the first heart transplant operation was successfully performed by the medical staff of Ruijin Hospital affiliated to Shanghai Second Hospital, and the patient survived after operation 109 days.
Stanford University Medical Center has performed the most heart transplants. From 1968 to 1978, the medical center performed 157 heart transplants. After heart transplantation, the patient 1 year survival rate was 47%, the 5-year survival rate was 20%, and the longest survival rate after transplantation was 7 years.
Because of the difficulty of heart transplantation, people are currently exploring another way-developing an artificial mechanical heart to replace it.