 |
In the News
Dr. Reza Jarrahy Discusses UCLA Face Transplant Program
Co-Surgical Directory of the Face Transplant Program disscuss Face Transplanation with radio host Jakki Price on WKKB 1520 AM (Buffalo, NY) Listen »
UCLA Performs First Breathing Lung Transplantation in U.S.
The lung transplant team at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical successfully performed the nation's first "breathing lung" transplant Nov 2012. The groundbreaking transplant involved an experimental organ-preservation device known as the Organ Care System (OCS), which keeps donor lungs functioning and "breathing" in a near-physiologic state outside the body during transport. The current standard involves transporting donor lungs in a non-functioning, non-breathing state inside an icebox. Watch video »
UCLA's heart transplant program ranked among nation's best
UCLA's program is one of only seven heart transplant centers nationwide - and the only one in California - to be ranked at the silver level by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), which has federal oversight of the nation's organ donation and transplantation network. Read more »
UCLA Transplant Doctors Honored for Life-Saving Work
Double-lung transplant recipient State Senator Runner praises doctors' dedication. Read more »
The Woman Who Lived
The Atascadero News profiles Meara Schmidt who underwent a double-lung transplant. Read more »
Celebrating Nurses in Los Angeles
May 2012 Issue
Advance for Nurses profiles nurse manager of the UCLA Heart and Lung Transplant program, Caron Burch, MSN, RN, FNP, CCTC. Read more »
California Senator Sharon Runner speaks about her experience receiving a double lung transplant
March 27, 2012
Video courtesy of KCBS Channel 2. Click here for the full story »
UCLA launches program to provide face, hand and abdominal wall transplants
July 11, 2011
While lifesaving solid-organ transplants have become increasingly common at major centers such as UCLA, reconstructive transplantation - a complex surgery involving composite tissues (bones, tendons, arteries, nerves) - marks a new direction for the field. Unlike organ transplants, which are performed to save lives, reconstructive transplants aim to dramatically improve them. Full Story »
UCLA's First Hand Transplant Patient Adapting Well to New Hand
April 19, 2011
26-year-old single mom looking forward to doing the 'little things' again. Six-and-a-half weeks after receiving the first hand transplant in the western United States, Emily Fennell is becoming so accustomed to her new right hand that she barely remembers when she didn't have one.
UCLA's heart transplant program ranked best in the U.S.
Dec. 9, 2010
A new survey by an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Resources has recognized the heart transplant program at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center as the nation's best. The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) presented UCLA with the award Nov. 3 at its organ donation conference in Grapevine, Texas. The HRSA survey is designed to evaluate and recognize the country's highest performing organ transplant programs. UCLA's was the only heart transplant program in the U.S. to be ranked at the silver level. Read more »
Associated Press Details New Study to Test Warm Beating Hearts in Transplant
Dec 6, 2010
The Associated Press on Dec. 5 featured a new multi-center study led by Dr. Abbas Ardehali, professor of cardiothoracic surgery and surgical director of the UCLA Heart Transplant program at UCLA, that is testing whether an experimental box which keeps a donated heart warm and beating can offer an improved method of transportation over the traditional way of carrying the organ on ice in a cooler. Ardehali was quoted, along with Dr. Richard Shemin, professor and chief of cardiothoracic surgery. Read more »
Related stories:
- Doctors testing warm, beating hearts in transplant (The Huffington Post)
- Beat still, my heart: Doctors transplant warm, ticking hearts in study; no more ice chests (Star Tribune)
UCLA team uncovers mechanism behind organ transplant rejection
Nov 18, 2010
by Elaine Schmidt
UCLA researchers have pinpointed the culprit behind chronic rejection of heart, lung and kidney transplants. Published in the Nov. 23 edition of Science Signaling, their findings suggest new therapeutic approaches for preventing transplant rejection and sabotaging cancer growth. Read more »
Their bond is sharing the gift of life
Aug 30, 2010
by Dennis McCarthy
It was a perfect night for barbecue, champagne toasts, and new friends getting the chance to match faces with the names that had come to mean so much to them. Few of the 40 people celebrating in the backyard of Fern and Ross Bloom's Chatsworth home Saturday night had met before, but you would have never known it. They gave each other warm hugs and handshakes like they were close family. In many ways, they are. Now.
All of them had either donated a kidney to - or received one from - someone there. Read more »
UCLA launches first West coast human hand transplantation program
Jul 26, 2010
Qualified candidates are now being sought for a clinical study of the procedure. The program will help those who have suffered the traumatic loss of a hand or forearm and allow them to regain function and improve their quality of life. Learn more »
Gov. Schwarzenegger Announces Legislation to Increase Organ Donation Opportunities
Mar 19, 2010
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger today joined Apple Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs and Senator Elaine Alquist (D-Santa Clara) at the Lucile Packard Children's Hospital in Palo Alto to announce the introduction of SB 1395, legislation that will make it easier for Californians to affirm their preferred organ donor status. Read more »
Kidney recipients' families pay it forward
Nov 8, 2009
By Dennis McCarthy
Day after day after day, Fern Bloom returned to knock on Dr. Jeffrey Veale's door at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.
When's it going to be my turn, the Chatsworth woman wanted to know. When can I pay back this incredible gift I've just received?
Her husband, Ross, was alive, thanks to the transplant of a kidney donated by a stranger. Now, Fern wanted to return the favor, to be that donor for someone else. Just tell her when.
"No one in the chain backed out - that's what we were a little worried about," Dr. Veale said Friday. "Everyone came through." Read full story »
Kidney transplants at UCLA Medical Center have a domino effect
Oct 23, 2009
By Molly Hennessy-Fiske
At 8:25 Thursday morning, Dr. Peter Schulam extracted a healthy kidney from a 60-year-old woman, slipped it into a bowl of sterile ice and wheeled it into the operating room next door. The donor, Nancy Seruto, a San Dimas mother, had never met the recipient, a 67-year-old retired flight attendant from Santa Ana.
Less than two hours later, Seruto's husband was on the same operating table at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. Another stranger, a 53-year-old Chatsworth mother of two, was giving him a kidney.
They were among 18 patients paired by surgeons as part of a rare transplant chain, built largely on trust. Read full story »
Kidney Chain that pays it forward could help thousands
June 4, 2009
By CBC News
Dr. Jeffrey Veale, who graduated from the University of Calgary and now works at UCLA, is one of the first doctors who promoted kidney transplant chains based on the idea of "paying it forward" - that the beneficiary of a good deed will, in turn, do one for someone else.
The chain begins with an altruistic donor who gives a kidney to someone with a relative who wanted to donate but wasn't a match. That relative's kidney is then donated to a stranger in the same situation, and the chain continues for as long as possible. Read full story »
UCLA Heart Transplant Recipient Honored
Apr 17, 2009
By Denise Dador
KABC-Channel 7 reported Friday on Bill Sears, who received a heart transplant at UCLA eight years ago and now volunteers full time with heart transplant patients at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center and with a UCLA-based medical mission that travels to South America to aid children with heart ailments. Dr. Jon Kobashigawa, clinical professor of cardiology and medical director of UCLA's heart transplant program, was featured in the report. Click for video and story link: Former heart patient has hope for life »
Rose Parade reunites surgeon, transplant patient after 25 years
Dec. 31, 2008
By Enrique Rivero
![Milt Bemis (from left) and his wife, Janis; Dr. Busuttil holding a photograph of Matthew Bemis; and Lily and Brian Allen. [Photos: MosesSparks.com]](images/site/group-matthew-allen-sm.jpg "Milt Bemis (from left) and his wife, Janis; Dr. Busuttil holding a photograph of Matthew Bemis; and Lily and Brian Allen. [Photos: MosesSparks.com]")
Among the 46 floral entries that dazzled the millions of Rose Parade watchers on the street and at home was one special float dedicated to those individuals whose invaluable donations of organs, corneas or tissue have saved and healed others in need. Read full article »
Rose-Parade Float Riders Profiled by Regional TV
Dec. 30, 2008
By Dennis Kellogg
KHAS-Channel 5 (Hastings, NE) on Dec. 30 profiled a husband and wife who donated their drowned two-year-old son’s liver to a California toddler who underwent her transplant 24 years ago at UCLA Medical Center. The newly married young woman was slated to ride the “Donate Life” float in the Rose Parade on New Years Day. KEYT-Channel 3 (Santa Barbara) on Dec. 23 also profiled float rider Joe Darga, a 74-year-old UCLA heart transplant recipient, who was honored for his extensive volunteer efforts to educate the public about organ donation. “One Life is Given to Save Another.”
Couple becomes link in life-changing kidney 'chain'
Dec. 16, 2008
By Cynthia Lee / UCLA Today
Steven Shaevel has already given his wife, Gail, the best holiday gift he could ever imagine. He gave up a kidney – but not to Gail, who already received a life-saving kidney transplant from a complete stranger a month earlier at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.
Shaevel, director of academic personnel for the UCLA School of Dentistry, gave his kidney to another stranger, who had it transplanted at Stanford Hospital on the same day Shaevel donated it, Nov. 19. His wife received her kidney because Shaevel agreed to donate his. Read full article »
West Clovis High Football Player with Chronic Pancreatitis Receives Islet Transplant at UCLA
Nov. 08, 2008
By Matt James / The Fresno Bee
Caleb Iness woke up Thursday with an aching gut so he stayed in bed all day.
On Friday morning his mother took him to the doctor's office. They weren't sure what it might be, maybe an ulcer, more likely irritable bowel syndrome, so the doctor quadrupled his medication and Caleb went to class at Clovis West High.
That night, as he has all football season, he padded his midsection and started at right tackle for the Golden Eagles. They beat Madera High, badly.
"Caleb will go weeks and be fine," says Clovis West coach Gary Kinne. "Then he'll miss a couple practices. This week he missed Wednesday and Thursday. The kids know what's going on. They know he wouldn't miss unless it was real."
The current pain is real annoying, but it's nothing compared to where Caleb Iness has been. His teammates and classmates and teachers are aware that he has been sick, that he has suffered, that he has missed an entire year of school, but they couldn't possibly understand.
A Daisy Chain of Kidney Donations
Sep 23, 2008
By Rhonda Rundle / The Wall Street Journal
Pamela Heckathorn received a kidney from an anonymous donor on July 30. The operation not only allowed the 51-year-old to avoid dialysis treatments; it also kicked off a chain of transplants that have benefited a number of other kidney patients. Read full article »
