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Doctors from Hubei Province have successfully transplanted the kidneys of a baby born prematurely in a 47-year-old woman with kidney failure.
The donor weighed only 1.3 kg, the lightest kidney donor ever, said Wednesday the Wuhan Union Hospital.
The woman, named Wang, from Duchang County, Jiangxi Province, was diagnosed with uremia last June and a transplant was performed a month later.
Without the transplant, she should have used dialysis for the rest of her life.
The kidneys used during the surgery came from a baby born prematurely, whose parents decided to donate organs after the baby's death, the hospital said.
After one year of follow-up treatment, the baby's kidneys, which were 3 to 4 cm long, were 6.9 cm and 7.6 cm in the patient's body, which is close to the usual size. 10 cm for an adult.
Both kidneys are functioning normally and Wang 's health has recovered, the hospital said.
Grafts using kidneys given by infants are very difficult compared to kidneys given by adults. Generally, babies weighing less than 5 kg are not considered organs for transplants abroad, said the hospital.
Wang Zhendi, hospital transplant specialist surgeon and female doctor, said the blood vessels and ureter, tube that carries urine from the kidneys to the bladder, are very thin in the kidneys of infants. This makes the surgery very difficult, with higher risks of postoperative complications. It is also harder for such kidneys to function in the body of an adult as they are not fully developed.
"The less weight the donor has, the more slowly the kidney recovers into the body where it is grafted," he said.
Although an adult can survive with a single kidney, two kidneys are usually transplanted from an infant in order to improve the chances of success for health, he said.
The success of the surgery means that the sources of kidney transplants can be expanded to include infant donors. This will reduce the gap between the number of donated organs and the number of patients with end-stage renal failure awaiting a transplant in China, the hospital said.
In the only hospital in Wuhan Union, more than 500 registered patients with renal failure are waiting for appropriate organs for a transplant, announced the hospital.
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