EDITOR’S NOTE: Watch “Dr. Sanjay Gupta Reports: Animal Pharm” on Sunday, May 18 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on NCS.
Tim Andrews knew that he wanted dialysis to handle his end-stage kidney illness, however over months of remedy, he began to wonder if it was price it. He was exhausted and hopeless. He missed his grandkids.
It stored him alive, but it surely didn’t really feel like living.
Desperate for an additional choice, he discovered a stunning various: an organ from a pig.
Andrews, 67, is a pioneer of a new variety of drugs. In January, he had an experimental cross-species transplant of a kidney from a genetically modified pig. He is one of solely a handful of sufferers who’ve undergone the experimental process. For now, he’s the lone individual within the United States identified to be living with a pig kidney.
Andrews knew that there was a danger to attempting one thing so new, but when the kidney gave him just yet another day free from dialysis, it was price it — for him and for fellow sufferers.
“This will do something for humanity,” Andrews mentioned.
Andrews had been living with diabetes because the Nineteen Nineties, managing the situation with insulin. About 2½ years in the past, he went to the physician feeling unusually tired. Tests confirmed that he had stage 3 kidney failure — his kidneys had been nonetheless working however much less effectively than they need to. He was relieved to be taught that it was manageable with medicine, monitoring and way of life modifications.
But about a month later, a physician delivered extra dangerous information: Andrews’ kidney illness had quickly progressed to end-stage illness. Dialysis was the one choice to preserve him alive till he may get an organ transplant.
Dialysis is very efficient at cleansing the blood, but it surely locations a “huge burden” on the physique, Andrews’ medical doctors instructed NCS. At first, Andrews thought it was going properly. But about six months in, he had a heart assault.
“It takes a toll on you, emotionally and physically,” mentioned Andrews, who lives in New Hampshire.
He was tempted to forgo dialysis completely till a physician warned that if he did so, he ought to “pick a box.” With the state his kidneys had been in, his physique could be in it inside a couple months.
For six hours, three days a week, he stored at it. On days off, he’d sleep. By the time he wakened, he’d have to begin the method another time.
When he thinks about his expertise with dialysis, Andrews appreciates what the medical doctors and nurses did to maintain him alive. But when he stored having to sit down in that outsized inexperienced chair hooked as much as the dialysis machine, the entire state of affairs damage his spirit, too.
He was too tired to stroll or get groceries. He couldn’t eat. Even within the few hours he felt OK, his immune system was so weak that he needed to keep away from crowds. Dialysis meant no extra Red Sox video games, no extra enjoyable with grandchildren, no extra journey.
As the hours ticked previous, he couldn’t take into consideration gratitude. All he may take into consideration was loss of life.
The dialysis unintended effects bought so dangerous that he wished to stop, however his spouse, Karen, wouldn’t let him. He additionally stored listening to his father’s voice in his thoughts, telling him to cease complaining and begin doing one thing about his state of affairs.
Andrews realized that his odds of getting a human kidney donation weren’t good.
Nearly 90,0000 people are on the ready checklist for a kidney within the US. Most don’t get a transplant as a result of they grow to be too sick or die whereas ready for a match.
Andrews’ probabilities had been slimmer than most as a result of of his uncommon blood sort. People usually wait about three to 5 years for a donor kidney. For him, it could possible be seven to 10 years. Doctors thought his physique may take solely 5 years of dialysis.
“I was a little short there,” Andrews mentioned. “I know what end-stage means.”
But his analysis gave him hope. Massachusetts General Hospital was additionally investigating animal options. He demanded that the hospital liaison put him in contact with one of the medical doctors from that undertaking: Dr. Leonardo Riella, medical director of kidney transplantation at Mass General.
When they first met, Andrews was “very frail,” Riella mentioned. He arrived in a wheelchair. But when Riella talked about what’s referred to as xenotransplantation — transplants utilizing genetically modified pig organs — Andrews’ eyes “sparked.”
“He said ‘Tell me what I need to do.’ ”
Riella instructed Andrews he’d must get a lot stronger if he wished a transplant of any variety.
“They said, ‘Prepare your body for battle,’ ” Andrews’ spouse, Karen, remembered.
For the following few months, Andrews went to the fitness center and bodily remedy, bought his enamel fastened, bought a number of vaccines and misplaced 22 kilos.
When he went again to the clinic a few months later, Riella mentioned, Andrews was “almost running around the room.”
He talked to individuals concerning the process. He prayed. His spouse, Karen, additionally needed to agree: If they bought the inexperienced gentle, she would wish to signal consent papers. On the slim probability he bought a virus from the organ, she’d be uncovered to it, too.
“I was a little taken aback by that,” Karen mentioned. But she didn’t have any doubt that this transplant, although uncommon, was the appropriate approach to go.
“It has to be better than dialysis,” she mentioned. “He was just feeling so awful all the time.”
In January, it was lastly time.
On surgical procedure day, his household hugged and kissed him goodbye. Karen gave him a high-five and wished him luck.
The process was imagined to take 4 hours, however solely about two hours and quarter-hour in, Karen mentioned, her telephone rang. The medical doctors had been finished early and mentioned it went “unbelievably well.”
A team of doctors instructed Karen that they’d efficiently hooked up the genetically modified pig kidney alongside Andrews’ nonfunctioning organ.
“They put the kidney on the table and started connecting him to the kidney, and he actually peed across the room,” Karen mentioned, laughing. Everyone within the working room began cheering.
“Of course, I started bawling like a baby,” Karen mentioned.
It all occurred so quick that even the medical doctors who did the surgical procedure had been shocked.
“It worked right away, and the numbers started getting better,” Riella mentioned.
After waking up from surgical procedure, Andrews felt “reenergized and revitalized.”
“I was alive, and I hadn’t been in a long time,” he mentioned.
He hopped out of bed and tap-danced throughout the room, he mentioned. His thoughts felt clear.
“It was a miracle,” Andrews mentioned. So a lot so, he declared that he had a new birthday.
“I said ‘look at me, it’s like I’m like a new man,’ ” he mentioned. “It’s like new birth. I said, ‘I’ve got a new birthday. 1/25/25 is my new birthday.’ ”
After the transplant, Andrews spent a week within the hospital however solely out of an abundance of warning.
In the months since, he’s had a few “small bumps in the road,” together with a three-week hospital keep. But the pig kidney does what a kidney from a living human donor would do.
Life is returning to regular. Andrews cooks, vacuums and takes lengthy walks along with his canine, Cupcake.
He at the moment takes greater than 50 tablets each day because the medical doctors strive to determine the sort of medicines he’ll want along with his new kidney. But living with out dialysis has made such a distinction.
“Basically, I was just sleeping, sick all the time. Now I can do anything I want,” Andrews mentioned.
He even lets himself image a future. He can’t wait to see his grandkids once more.
“They saw me at the lowest, and now they’ll be able to see me alive and laughing and carrying on like Grandpa does,” Andrews mentioned.
If all goes properly, he hopes to take Karen to Europe in a yr. He mentioned they’ve put it off far too lengthy.
Still, Andrews is aware of that the pig kidney might not work long-term. He’s nonetheless on the wait checklist for a human organ. If the pig kidney can act as a bridge that retains him wholesome sufficient to attend for a match from a human donor, that might be a medical first — and a success.
Andrews is the fourth living affected person within the US to get a genetically modified pig kidney transplant, and he gained’t be the final. In addition to the continuing trial at Mass General along with biotech agency eGenesis, United Therapeutics Corp – the opposite principal biotech firm serving to create the pig kidneys – introduced in February that it could be allowed to begin its personal scientific trials with New York University.
In March 2024, Richard Slayman turned the primary living affected person on the earth to get a genetically modified pig kidney. The operation at Mass General went properly, however he died two months later from causes not associated to the transplant.
Doctors mentioned they realized a lot from their expertise with Slayman. He had scarring on his coronary heart after eight years of dialysis, Riella mentioned, and it’s in all probability vital to get sufferers like Andrews, who haven’t wanted dialysis as lengthy.
In April 2024, Lisa Pisano turned the primary individual to obtain a mechanical coronary heart pump in addition to a gene-edited pig kidney. The organ failed attributable to restricted blood move and was removed the following month. She died in July 2024.
Then, in November 2024, NYU transplanted 53-year-old Towana Looney with a genetically modified pig kidney. It functioned for 4 months and 9 days, the longest but, however medical doctors needed to remove it in April when her immune system began to reject it.
Figuring out methods to handle rejection goes to be key, medical doctors say. The pig kidneys Andrews and Slayman bought had 69 genomic edits, whereas Looney’s had fewer. Doctors say they nonetheless don’t know what number of edits are needed, however each variations of the modified pig kidneys had pig genes eliminated and human genes added to make the organ extra appropriate with the human physique.
Patients additionally obtain anti-rejection medicine and wearable distant monitoring instruments. But medical doctors nonetheless are determining how a lot drugs and monitoring is required.
“It is a learning curve,” Riella mentioned.
Riella is hopeful xenotransplantation might someday remedy the world’s organ scarcity.
“I think patients like Tim will be remembered as heroes,” he mentioned. “Without them willing to take the risk, we wouldn’t be able to move this to the clinic.”
Andrews remembers what it felt prefer to need to make the selection. But he additionally remembers what it was like to sit down for hours at the dialysis heart.
“It’s hard to come to terms with mortality. You think ‘ah, I can handle that’ and everything, but it’s tough,” he mentioned lately, again within the inexperienced chair the place he underwent dialysis. “It was very powerful to comprehend that was it.
“I was going to die in this building.”
He discovered a means out. He hopes his story will encourage others to search for hope, too.
“I see way too many people give up,” Andrews mentioned. “Don’t give up.”