Helping Organs Survive Outside the Donor’s Body

Organ transplants are operations performed when a critical organ is so sick that it can no longer function to keep the patient alive. About one in every 330 people in the United States has received an organ transplant at some point in their life. Doctors can replace the heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, pancreas, and bowel. Some replacement organs can come from living people, while most come from donors who have died. Once the organ is removed from the donor’s body, it must be kept healthy so that it can work well in its new body. Unfortunately, there are not enough organs available for all the people who need them. Therefore, to save lives, it is important to improve organ donation, preservation, and transplantation. In this article, we describe machines and techniques that can keep organs healthy. Machines can also help doctors decide whether an organ will work well after it is transplanted.