Hearts, kidneys and other donated organs have added more than 2 million years to the lives of the American patients who received them, according to a new analysis. 
 
 That tally, published this week by the journal JAMA Surgery, covers 25 years of organ donation in the U.S. Researchers started with 1987, the year when the United Network for Organ Sharing began keeping track of all organ transplants in the U.S. 
 
 Between Sept. 1, 1987, and Dec. 31, 2012, 533,329 patients received a donated organ (or perhaps two). Another 579,506 patients were put on the UNOS waiting list but didn’t get an organ. By comparing the outcomes for patients in both groups, the researchers were able to calculate how much longer the transplant recipients lived as a result of their new organs. 
 
 So far, that number adds up to 2,270,859 years – a “stellar accomplishment,” according to the study authors. And that number will keep on getting bigger as long as any of the transplant recipients are still alive. 
 
 More than half of those extra years – 1,372,969 of them – have been lived by people who had kidney transplants, the researchers calculated. Another 465,296 extra years have been lived by recipients of new livers, and 269,715 years have been lived by people who got new hearts. The other beneficiaries included people who received new lungs (64,575 extra years), a new pancreas (14,903 extra years), a pancreas and a kidney (79,198 extra years) and intestines (4,402 extra years). 
 
 The analysis does not include patients who had rare kinds of transplants, such as heart-pancreas transplants and liver-lung transplants, because there were too few of these procedures to be able to make good comparisons with patients who needed such transplants but didn’t get them. 
 
 The researchers also calculated the number of years gained per patient, based on the type of transplant they received. By this measure, heart transplants were the most successful, giving patients an extra 4.9 years, on average. Patients who had a combined pancreas-kidney transplant (to treat kidney failure due to type 1 diabetes) lived an average of 4.6 years longer than their counterparts who went on the wait list but didn’t get new organs. Kidney recipients averaged 4.4 extra years, liver recipients averaged 4.3 extra years, intestine recipients averaged 2.8 extra years and pancreas recipients averaged 2.6 extra years, according to the study. 
 
 These results may cause some people to rethink the benefits of organ transplants, the researchers wrote. For instance, a kidney transplant is often viewed as “merely a life-enhancing” surgery, since someone who doesn’t get a new kidney can make do on dialysis. But with a typical kidney transplant patient benefiting more than a typical liver transplant patient, the operation should be considered “a lifesaving procedure,” they wrote. 
 
 The same argument can be made for transplants involving a pancreas, which are sometimes viewed as “simply a convenient insulin replacement therapy,” they added. 
 
 All of this good news was tempered by one statistic, however: only 48% of patients sick enough to be put on the UNOS waiting list are able to get new organs, according to the study. That means more people need to be willing to donate their organs. 
 
 “The critical shortage of donors continues to hamper this field,” the researchers wrote. If more donors come forward and more transplants are performed, Americans can make good on the “tremendous potential to do even more good for humankind in the future.” 
 
 For more medical news, follow me on Twitter @LATkarenkaplan and "like" Los Angeles Times Science & Health on Facebook. ||||| The results of a new JAMA study may double as a call to action for organ donation: More than two million years of life have been saved by solid-organ transplant since the late 80s. These transplants refer to the kidneys, liver, heart, lungs, pancreas, and intestines. 
 
 Researchers analyzed data from The United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) and the Social Security Administration Master File to determine the survival benefit of transplants from September 1987 through 2012. This involved records of more than 1.1 million patients: 533,329 received an organ transplant while 579,506 were placed on a waiting list (and did not receive a transplant). As mentioned, the results showed 2,270,859 years of life were saved, which averages to 4.3 years of life for every patient who received a transplant. 
 
 The drawback: Only 48 percent of patients on waiting lists received a transplant over the study’s 25-year period, which researchers suggest is due to a shortage of donors. A note on waiting lists from the U.S. Department of Health and Services: Patients are allowed to register at multiple transplant centers, so you may see a higher number if you count registrations rather than candidates. 
 
 However, both the present study and the department agree more people should consider organ donation. 
 
 “The need is increasing: therefore, organ donation must increase,” researchers concluded. “We call for deepened support of solid-organ transplant and donation — worthy endeavors with a remarkable record of achievement and a tremendous potential to do even more good for humankind in the future.” 
 
 Admittedly, for both potential donors and patients, organ transplants are cause for trepidation. Candidates for kidney transplants, for example, worry they’ll jeopardize (and generally inconvenience) donor’s health and feel unworthy of such altruism. And on the donor side, perpetuating organ donation myths discourage people from checking off that box. (No, your doctor is not less likely to save your life if you’ve elected to be a donor.) 
 
 Prior research points a finger toward the obesity epidemic for such a shortage in solid organs, namely for kidney transplants. A lack of kidneys make up 84 percent of all the organ demands in the U.S. and diabetes and hypertension are the two causes of renal failure — both conditions caused by obesity. 
 
 Organ transplant and donation have come a long way since the National Organ Transplant Act was passed in 1984. In 2010, researchers from Kings College-London started developing new science that would help prevent rejection of the new organ and extend a donor’s life. As the need for donation grows, all hands are on deck to ensure the waiting list lessens and more lives are saved each year, both patient and donor alike. 
 
 Source: Rana A, et al. Survival Benefit of Sold-Organ Transplant in the United States. JAMA Surgery. 2015. ||||| Importance The field of transplantation has made tremendous progress since the first successful kidney transplant in 1954. 
 
 Objective To determine the survival benefit of solid-organ transplant as recorded during a 25-year study period in the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) database and the Social Security Administration Death Master File. 
 
 Design, Setting, and Participants In this retrospective analysis of UNOS data for solid-organ transplant during a 25-year period (September 1, 1987, through December 31, 2012), we reviewed the records of 1 112 835 patients: 533 329 recipients who underwent a transplant and 579 506 patients who were placed on the waiting list but did not undergo a transplant. 
 
 Main Outcomes and Measures The primary outcome was patient death while on the waiting list or after transplant. Kaplan-Meier survival functions were used for time-to-event analysis. 
 
 Results We found that 2 270 859 life-years (2 150 200 life-years from the matched analysis) were saved to date during the 25 years of solid-organ transplant. A mean of 4.3 life-years were saved (observed to date) per solid-organ transplant recipient. Kidney transplant saved 1 372 969 life-years; liver transplant, 465 296 life-years; heart transplant, 269 715 life-years; lung transplant, 64 575 life-years; pancreas-kidney transplant, 79 198 life-years; pancreas transplant, 14 903 life-years; and intestine transplant, 4402 life-years. 
 
 Conclusions and Relevance Our analysis demonstrated that more than 2 million life-years were saved to date by solid-organ transplants during a 25-year study period. Transplants should be supported and organ donation encouraged. ||||| Reuters Health - Transplanting a mismatched kidney from a living donor may lower the risk of death more than not doing a transplant at all, according to a new study that could open the door to more operations. 
 
 Surgeon Karim Zalazun looks at a monitor displaying a donor kidney for patient Adam Abernathy, who participated in a five-way organ transplant swap, in New York, August 1, 2012. REUTERS/Keith Bedford 
 
 A long-term study found that transplant recipients whose immune systems were technically incompatible to the donated kidney - because they had so-called anti-HLA antibodies - were more likely to be alive eight years later than people who did not receive a transplant or waited to get an organ from a deceased donor. 
 
 “We used to say if you had a compatible donor, you could do a transplant. Now you can say, if you have an incompatible donor, we still can make that transplant happen,” senior author Dr. Dorry Segev of John Hopkins University in Baltimore told Reuters Health. “That’s very exciting to those on the waiting list.” 
 
 Eight-year survival rates were almost 77 percent for 1,025 people who received an HLA-incompatible kidney from a live donor, 63 percent for 5,125 matched patients who remained on a waiting list for a kidney or received a kidney from a deceased donor and 44 percent for 5,125 people who remained on the waiting list without receiving a kidney. 
 
 “The paper is showing how much longer the patient will live compared to their next available option,” said Segev, who directs John Hopkins’ Epidemiology Research Group in Organ Transplantation. “Your next best option is waiting on the list for a compatible donor, and a lot of those patients will never find one.” 
 
 The study was done at 22 centers. It could help the more than 32,000 people in the United States who have anti-HLA antibodies and need a transplant. 
 
 “It’s all about timing,” said Dr. Sanjay Kulkarni, director of kidney and pancreas transplantation at Yale-New Haven Hospital and the Yale School of Medicine, who was not involved in the research. “The longer people are on dialysis before they have a transplant, the worse their survival,” he said. 
 
 “So if you have a living donor, instead of waiting five years for a compatible donor, if you can get a transplant from an incompatible donor in a couple of months, this paper suggests that that is beneficial, despite the fact that they have a higher rate of rejection,” he told Reuters Health. 
 
 “The implications of these results are revolutionary, especially when the numerous contradictory opinions raised by the transplant community are considered,” said Drs. Lionel Rostaing and Paolo Malvezzi of the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Grenoble Alpes in La Tronche, France, in an editorial accompanying the study in the New England Journal of Medicine. 
 
 Desensitizing recipients can be very expensive, they said, and the immunosuppressive regimens required carry the potential of infection and cancer. In addition, living donors face a small but significant increase in their risk of end stage renal disease. 
 
 Nonetheless, Rostaing and Malvezzi write, using incompatible kidneys from living donors “may save lives and may be cost-effective over time.” 
 
 There is an added cost, but it is relatively small, Segev said. 
 
 Each patient’s immune system has to be desensitized to accept the incompatible kidney. Depending on antibody levels, “it can take a few days to a couple of weeks,” he said. “But compared to the cost of a transplant, it’s relatively low. If a transplant costs perhaps $100,000 and you add desensitization, it might be $110,000 to $120,000.” 
 
 There’s the additional cost of $10,000 or so each year for drugs to keep the immune system from rejecting the kidney. “But compared to $100,000 a year f dialysis,” he said, a transplant quickly becomes cost effective over time. 
 
 Kulkarni cautioned that the organ donation system was changed just over two years ago to make it easier for hard-to-match patients to get a kidney from a deceased donor. 
 
 Now “people are getting transplanted much quicker” so today’s survival rates may not be as dramatically different as they are in the new study, he said. “But I bet they still hold.” 
 
 SOURCE: bit.ly/24R0D0j New England Journal of Medicine, online March 9, 2016.
– Organ donors added 2,270,859 years to the lives of American transplant recipients over 25 years—a "stellar accomplishment," experts say in a study published Wednesday in JAMA Surgery. They arrived at the figure after identifying 533,329 patients who received at least one donated organ between Sept. 1, 1987, and Dec. 31, 2012. They then compared that group to another 579,506 patients who were put on an organ waiting list but didn't receive one to determine the transplants' effect on lifespan, the Los Angeles Times reports. According to their calculations, people who had kidney transplants lived 1,372,969 extra years, liver recipients lived 465,296 extra years, and heart recipients lived 269,715 extra years. An average of 4.3 years were added to a life per transplant. In terms of specific surgeries, heart transplants gave patients an extra 4.9 years on average, while pancreas recipients averaged 2.6 extra years. The study shows many surgeries, including kidney transplants, are actually "lifesaving," rather than "life-enhancing," experts say. However, as 52% of those who needed organs went without over those 25 years, "organ donation must increase" in order "to do even more good for humankind in the future," researchers say, per Medical Daily. About 123,000 Americans are now waiting for organ transplants. Some of the 102,000 who need kidneys could be helped by living donors, though lost wages and other donor-related costs (average: $5,000) can be a deterrent for potential donors, Reuters reports. (A recent study found that kidney donors have brains "built for compassion.")