Whole Organ Transplantation Medicine

286 Words2 Pages
In 1954, the world of medicine took a huge step of advancement when the first successful whole organ transplant occurred between homozygotic twins. Richard Herrick was suffering from kidney failure and was given little hope of a cure until Doctor Joseph Murray decided to take the risk of conducting a kidney transplant between Richard and his healthy twin brother. As a result of the surgery, Richard Herrick lived eight more years (Guild, 1956). After 1954, the field of transplantation medicine was transformed from an experimental science to a clinical discipline that would give hope to thousands of people requiring new organs. Today, tissue and organ transplants involve not only the kidneys, but the lungs, pancreas, intestine, liver, heart,