A transplant is to remove (an organ) from one place and plant it in another – through surgery to transfer (an organ, tissue, etc.) from one part of the body to another or from one person or animal to another (Dictionary.com: 2020).
Over the past 17 years, we’ve measured ourselves by the joy we see on the faces of the needy children we’ve helped through our paediatric corneal transplant programme and the improvements in treatment brought about by our cutting-edge research. Today, many keratoconus patients are suffering from severe financial hardship due to the economic downturn and are unable to afford treatment. Cure KC will ensure that no patient with keratoconus, no matter how financially needy, be denied adequate treatment and all patients with keratoconus ultimately have better lives because of advances in treatment brought about by our research. With your support, one day through our research efforts no one will have to suffer from keratoconus.
(The Eye Defects Research Foundation © 2010).
Successful renal transplantation is the optimal treatment for chronic kidney failure, but this was not always so for children. Beginning with the first kidney transplants in the 1950s, children experienced poorer patient and graft survival rates than adult patients. While renal transplantation quickly became an accepted and preferred mode of therapy in adults, 60 years ago children were allowed to die of renal failure. This was due to the ethical conundrum of the benefit versus risk of aggressive therapy in children with renal failure. While in some countries this remains a reality, this is no longer the case in many places. In fact, in the United States, children get priority on the waitlist for the best-deceased donor kidneys (Dharmendra; Lamb & Meier-Kirsches. Best allograft survival from share-35 kidney donors occurs in middle-aged adults and young children-an analysis of OPTN data. Transplantation 2013; 95:319–25).
Lung transplantation (TX) is a treatment option for infants and children with untreatable and otherwise fatal pulmonary diseases. To date, over 1800 lung transplants have been performed, most frequently in children over the age of five years. The most common indications for transplantation in children overall are cystic fibrosis (CF) and idiopathic pulmonary hypertension (PH). (Thorax Dis. 2014 Aug; 6(8): 1024–1031.doi: 10.3978/j.issn.2072-1439.2014.04.27).
Lung transplantation (TX) is a therapeutic option for children and infants with incurable and end-stage diseases of the lungs or pulmonary vascular system. While TX in this special age group carries unique challenges, there is ample evidence to suggest that outcomes are similar to those in adults. Paediatric TX offers the potential for prolonging life expectancy and also improving quality-of-life. (Thorax Dis. 2014 Aug; 6(8): 1024–1031.doi: 10.3978/j.issn.2072-1439.2014.04.27).
Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) is the transplantation of multipotent hematopoietic stem cells, usually derived from bone marrow, peripheral blood, or umbilical cord blood (Felly; Haddad, (2014). Hematopoietic stem cells: potential new applications for translational medicine. Journal of Stem Cells. 9 (3): 163–97. PMID 25157450). It may be autologous (the patient’s own stem cells are used), allogeneic (the stem cells come from a donor) or syngeneic (from an identical twin).
It is most often performed for patients with certain cancers of the blood or bone marrow, such as multiple myeloma or leukaemia. In these cases, the recipient’s immune system is usually destroyed with radiation or chemotherapy before the transplantation. Infection and graft-versus-host disease are major complications of allogeneic HSCT
(Park; You, & Kim, (December 2015). Hematopoietic stem cell expansion and generation: the ways to make a breakthrough. Blood Research. 50 (4): 194–203. doi:10.5045/br.2015.50.4.194. PMC 4705045. PMID 26770947).
Over the past decade, with improvements in organ transplantation, the number of indications for organ transplantation has continuously grown and the need for organ donation has steadily increased. Our results showed that transplanted organs were functioning in the majority of recipients (85.3%) within one year of transplantation. Because there has been only a short period (10 years) since the establishment of transplantation law from deceased donors in Iran, this survival rate can be considered a success. This significant success could not have been achieved without the painstaking effort of all the team members (Ghaemi¹, Ghaemi²& Zamyad¹. Survival Rate in Lung, Liver, Heart and Pancreas Transplant Recipients in Iran: A -Based Study. Registry INT Organ Transplant Med. 2013;4(3):118-121).
You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.
Khalil Gibran
