What started as a heroic effort to save a 5-year-old girl, has turned into one of the largest and most renowned transplant centers in the country. Baylor Annette C. and Harold C. Simmons Transplant Institute, a leader in solid organ transplantation in the U.S., has successfully transplanted more than 7,300 organs over the last 30 years, and continues to push the boundaries of innovation. Baylor Annette C. and Harold C. Simmons Transplant Institute combines the transplant services at Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas and Baylor All Saints Medical Center at Fort Worth.
"We plan to maintain our status as a recognized world leader in both transplant science and patient care," said Göran Klintmalm, M.D., Ph.D., chairman of the transplant institute since its inception. "We will do this not only by focusing on innovations in transplantation surgery, but also by researching alternative treatments."
Dr. Klintmalm has literally co-authored the textbook on liver transplantation, the surgery that began the Transplant Institute 30 years ago. Through the urging of then-First Lady Nancy Reagan, the medical community took notice of a little girl from Indiana named Amie Garrison, who was in desperate need of a liver transplant. The only resource at that time for the surgery, in Pittsburgh, P.A., could not take the case. The surgeon known as the father of solid organ transplantation, Thomas Starzl, M.D., Ph.D., asked a pioneering team of physicians at Baylor University Medical Center (BUMC) in Dallas to take the case.
Within hours of BUMC president and CEO Boone Powell Jr. agreeing to the operation, teams from Pennsylvania, Indiana and Canada -- where a pediatric donor liver was located -- mobilized to perform the time-sensitive surgery.
"I counted up once and figured out that it was 14,000 man miles traveled -- one-way -- to pull that off," noted John Fordtran, M.D., Ph.D., president of Baylor Research Institute, who was chief of internal medicine at the time of the 8 1/2-hour landmark surgery at Baylor.
The event christened the transplant institute as one of the first three transplant centers in the U.S., and set the tone for leadership for decades to come. Today, more liver transplants are performed at Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas and Baylor All Saints Medical Center at Fort Worth combined than anywhere else in Texas.
The man who performed Amie's surgery was a transplant himself: Dr. Klintmalm, a native of Sweden, came to the U.S. to build this much-needed program at BUMC and perform life-saving transplants 30 years ago.
"It is the challenge that makes us take these steps, to go forward where no one else has dared to go. Whether you are climbing a mountain, or in this case building an advanced transplant program, it's the challenge that makes people do the extraordinary," Klintmalm said.
Dr. Klintmalm and his team performed 30 transplants at the transplant institute in the first year. Other numbers over the program's 30-year existence include transplants of:
• 3,867 livers,
• 3,951 kidneys, • 256 pancreases, • 659 hearts • 360 lungs.
In all, more than 11,000 transplants have taken place. The team reached another milestone in 2014, performing 102 cardiac transplants in one year, and becoming one of the top two programs by volume in the U.S. for heart transplantation. Studies show that the more times a hospital performs a procedure, the better its success rate.
Baylor Annette C. and Harold C. Simmons Transplant Institute, which includes both Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas and Baylor All Saints Medical Center at Fort Worth, is one of the largest multi-specialty transplant centers in the country. Through the dedication of the transplant medical staff, Baylor has been "first" in a number of areas and is credited with milestones including:
- First and only adult living liver donor program in North Texas
- First islet cell transplant in North Texas
- First certified ventricular assist device (VAD) program in the U.S.
- First matched, unrelated donor bone marrow transplant in Texas
- First adult liver transplant in the Southwest
- World's first extra-corporeal perfusion (bridge to transplant) using a genetically engineered pig liver, allowing the patient to survive and successfully undergo liver transplantation
- First heart/lung/heart "domino" procedure in North Texas, in which a patient with terminal emphysema receives a single heart and two lungs, while another patient with cardiomyopathy receives the good heart from the patient with emphysema
- First paired kidney donor transplant in North Texas
Learn More: [ 2014 Transplant Institute Annual Report ]
The transplant institute participates in more than 120 research protocols and has trained more than 35 transplant surgeons and six hepatologists, many of whom have gone on to lead major transplant programs around the world. Years ago, Dr. Klintmalm managed large-scale clinical trials for cyclosporine, the anti-rejection drug that revolutionized transplantation. Today, Dr. Klintmalm and his team are working with investigators around the world to identify reasons why some organs are rejected and to find treatments, as well as study better preservation of donor organs, enabling them to become more useful.
The transplant institute team is continuing to find ways to explore new scientific boundaries. Scientists are investigating ways to use stem cells in creation and repair of organs, gene therapy, and immune system treatment to reduce the number of organs that are rejected. They continue to bring awareness to the critical shortage of donor organs, which unfortunately takes the lives of 18 people each day.
"Moving forward, we are proud of the success over the last 30 years in helping to restore countless lives, but understand the innovation and courage it takes to continue to be an innovative center," said Klintmalm.
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MEDIA CONTACT:
Craig Civale
Craig.Civale@BaylorHealth.edu
(817) 709-7067
Physicians provide clinical services as members of the medical staff at one of Baylor Scott & White Health's subsidiary, community or affiliated medical centers and do not provide clinical services as employees or agents of those medical centers, Baylor Health Care System, Scott & White Healthcare or Baylor Scott & White Health. Individual results may vary. Not all services available at all locations. ©2015 Baylor Scott & White Health.
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As the largest not-for-profit health system in the state of Texas, Baylor Scott & White promotes the health and well-being of every individual, family and community it serves. It is committed to making quality care more accessible, convenient and affordable through its integrated delivery network, which includes the Baylor Scott & White Health Plan, Baylor Scott & White Research Institute, the Baylor Scott & White Quality Alliance and its leading digital health platform – MyBSWHealth. Through 51 hospitals and more than 1,200 access points, including flagship academic medical centers in Dallas, Fort Worth and Temple, the system offers the full continuum of care, from primary to award-winning specialty care. Founded as a Christian ministry of healing more than a century ago, Baylor Scott & White today serves more than three million Texans. For more information, visit: BSWHealth.com