Medicine Breakthrough: 57Year-Old Kidney Still Functional 43 Years Post Transplant; Centennial Kidney Possible!

A transplanted kidney is believed to continue its function for around two decades after transplant, according to doctors. A 68-year-old woman in the United Kingdom has a transplanted kidney that is still working, which was transferred to her body when she was only 25 years old. This defies the predictions and beliefs made by doctors on the life span of transplanted kidneys.

Sue Westhead from County Durham is living on with a transplanted kidney for 43 years now. She recounted how she had difficulty in walking and was told that she only had one tenth of the normal renal function with her new kidneys, BBC reported. Her mother, Ann Metcalfe who was 57 at that time offered to give her kidney to Westhead, which is the same kidney living in her body until today.

Over four decades after the kidney was transplanted inside Westhead's body, the woman is still going strong with her mother's kidney. The transplanted kidney had lived in her mother's body for 57 years and now, has lived in hers for 43 years, making it an incredible 100 years old in effect. In November, the kidney will clock up another year but obviously, the individual cells have been regenerating themselves over that period, Daily Mail reported.

Westhead is now considered to have one of the world's oldest and most successfully transplanted kidney, outlasting the modern day estimate of 20 years by far. She remembered thinking that if she lives up to five years after her surgery, then she would be happy. She went on to explain how she was able to live by taking 20 pills since then to make sure that her organ is not rejected by her body.

Transplanted kidneys are common today, with 9 out of 10 patients waiting for the organs in the list. However, it is thought that most people need to wait for three to four years before a kidney becomes available. In the UK, around 53,000 patients are treated for kidney failure annually.