Ministers axe life-saving transplant device from heart hospital

A machine that keeps donor hearts alive for longer and may improve survival rates for transplant patients has been removed from one of the world’s leading heart centres because of funding problems.

The Organ Care System (OCS), which stalls tissue degeneration, keeps a donor heart beating until a suitable recipient is found.

The pioneering device has been on trial at Papworth Hospital in Cambridgeshire for the past two years and has been shown to extend the life of organs outside the body by between 12 and 15 hours.

They are otherwise put on ice and must be transplanted within six hours.

But the machine, manufactured by US-based firm TransMedics, was removed from the centre in July because the Department of Health wanted further studies done before it would pay for it.

The OCS has been used in nine operations with a 100 per cent success rate and has the added advantage of allowing doctors to identify hearts that are unsuitable for transplant.

The British Heart Foundation and UK Transplant said the OCS could double the number of transplants that could take place.

Steven Tsui, clinical director of transplant services at Papworth, said the hospital would continue to look at ways to support the technology.

The Department of Health said the OCS was ‘promising’ but there was ‘insufficient data’ to warrant its widespread use.