Lungs for Organ Transplants Can Live Outside the Body With the Help of a New Machine

There's new hope for patients waiting in line to receive an organ. A machine created by researchers at the University of Michigan has been shown to successfully keep lungs alive for days after death, greatly extending transplant potential for those in need. 

"Outside the body, without blood and oxygen, those cells start deteriorating quickly," Dr. Paul Lange, medical director of Gift of Life Michigan, a transplantation organization, said via the Detroit Free Press. "I've been in medicine for years, and I still think it's wild ... almost science fiction."

The machine was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration this month for use of human lungs for "humanitarian" cases, and is known as the XVIVO Perfusion system and is estimated to cost around $250,000.

As the lungs are a particularly fragile organ, many of these organs are often not suitable for recipients after a small window of time time has passed. In fact, statistics show that only about 20 percent of those tested will actually be used. However, health officials believe that the new device could mean big changes for this organ's shelf-life and helping those in need.

"If I can take those lungs out for a test drive (and) spend four hours with them instead of 15 minutes, maybe we decide they really are usable," added Dr. William Lynch, a University of Michigan transplant surgeon, via The Republic. 

The federal Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network estimates that out of the 1,900 lung transplants completed nationwide last year, about 354 patients died on the waiting list for lungs or became too ill to receive them.