Lung transplant can save some COVID-19 survivors

Surgeons worldwide have been performing lung transplants in COVID-19 survivors with irreversible lung damage, and an international group of transplant experts has proposed guidelines for selection of eligible patients.

To possibly qualify for a transplant, COVID-19 survivors with complete lung failure should be younger than 65, nonsmokers, and have no pre-existing medical conditions, or only manageable ones, they advise.

They said transplants should be performed at least four weeks after a diagnosis of irreversible lung damage. In the United States alone, more than 50 double lung transplants have been performed on COVID-19 survivors, and all the patients are alive, said Dr. Ankit Bharat of Northwestern Medicine in Chicago, who has performed a dozen of them.

A study published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine that examined 12 of the first double-lung transplants performed in COVID-19 patients in the United States, Italy, Austria and India showed that all but two survived and are doing well, said co-author Bharat.

“It’s a really remarkable outcome, given how critically ill these patients were,” he said. “Without the possibility of transplant, the medical team and the families were ready to withdraw care.