GRANTHAM Hospital plans to continue heart-lung transplants despite the death on Sunday of its first recipient.
Dr Clement Chiu Shui-wah, chief of service of the Cardiothoracic Unit, said last night the operation had been a technical success but complications developed later.
'She recovered very well in the first two weeks. She could even move around in the ward. But then she developed signs of bone marrow suppression,' said Dr Chiu.
Cecilia Lee Wong Chee-ying, 37, who became the territory's first heart and lungs transplant patient during a six-hour operation on December 5, died last Sunday due to a rare graft-versus-host disease, a condition described by Dr Chiu as always irretrievable.
The organs, donated from a Western female, developed lymph blood cells which were at odds with the patient's blood cells.
Dr Chiu said: 'There is no precedent showing whether problems will occur if the organs are from donors of different races. At this stage we don't know but we don't rule out this possibility.' It is the first transplant failure for the territory's premier centre for cardiac treatment. There have been five successful heart transplants and one lung transplant since the unit was formed in 1992.
