Unprecedented "Magic" Machine Blesses Man With New Lungs

By R. Siva Kumar - 16 Mar '15 08:46AM

Sometimes, magic strikes even the muggles. Kyle Clark's life was transformed by a medical miracle.

The University of Michigan has developed a new machine to keep donor lungs "alive" outside the human body for six hours. It gives doctors the bit of extra time that can make them check out the lungs, as the machine pumps special fluid through them, basically "reconditioning" them to enable transplantation, said Dr. Paul Lange, the medical director for Gift of Life Michigan, according to usatoday.

He called it a "game changer" that will in fact sustain the lungs that could easily be disposed off as unusable.

"People die every day on waiting lists for transplants," he said.

Clark, 25, of Imlay City, Mich., was the first in Michigan to get lungs from the new XVIVO Perfusion System - XPS, for short.

He had cystic fibrosis, which is a genetic condition that begins with mucus buildup in the lungs and other organs. It makes it tough to breathe and digest food, and can also lead on to infection, lung failure or even early death. The severity of the disease in every person also determines the duration of life.

Clark says that he can finally breathe, after a life-saving surgery.

The XPS kept his donor lungs "alive" and even flushed out the toxins, so that the lungs could be reused. "I feel great," Clark said last week from his hospital room. "I can't remember the last time I felt this way."

Lungs as an organ transplant are very vulnerable. A car accident could kill the donor and the lungs could even absorb some excessive fluids or contract pneumonia while the donor is admitted into intensive care, Lange said.

"What we'll find out is that a lot of these lungs are absolutely fine."

Surgeons do not want to make a weak patient undergo a transplant of lungs that are not too dependable. One in five pairs of lungs could be called "usable."

However, the XPS technology can accelerate the number of lungs and other organs that are accessible for transplant and save countless lives, said Dr. William Lynch, the transplant surgeon at the University of Michigan Medical Center in Ann Arbor, Clark's surgeon.

The University of Michigan and collaborators Henry Ford and Spectrum health systems are thought to be among the 10 sites around the US that contribute to the clinical trials for the machine, said Mary Pohl, who heads clinical research at Sweden-based XVIVO Perfusion.