Temple Hospital to resume heart and lung transplants

Philadelphia Inquirer | Stacey Burling

Temple University Hospital announced Thursday that it had reactivated its heart-, lung-, and heart/lung-transplant programs.

The hospital stopped performing lung transplants in May, after its primary lung-transplant surgeon left. It deactivated its heart-transplant program in July because of low patient volume.

Since then, it has recruited T. Sloan Guy as chief of cardiothoracic surgery and Yoshiya Toyoda as director of heart and lung transplantation and mechanical circulatory support.

Guy said the United Network of Organ Sharing, a nonprofit that manages the U.S. organ-transplant system, gave the hospital interim approval to restart the transplant programs earlier this week.

Before the deactivation, Temple's heart-transplant program had averaged five transplants a year, half the number needed to meet federal quality standards. The Pennsylvania Department of Health had said the lung program had a lower-than-expected survival rate.

Read more: http://www.philly.com/philly/business/138174974.html#ixzz1kfwhA24S