A breakthrough in surgery: the first heart transplant

Question 1

Heart transplant

Answer 1

When a heart that is not working properly is replaced with the healthy heart of a person who has just died

Question 2

Surgery

Answer 2

An operation by a doctor on a patient in a hospital

Question 3

Operation

Answer 3

When doctors cut into someone’s body to repair or remove a damaged part

Question 4

Anesthetic

Answer 4

A drug that puts the patient into a deep sleep so that they can be operated on

Question 5

Transfusion

Answer 5

Putting donated blood into the body

Question 6

Dr Chris Barnard

Answer 6

• In 1967, Dr Chris Barnard did the world’s first heart transplant surgery at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town in South Africa
• Discoveries which made heart surgery possible.
• There had already been many medical discoveries that made the heart transplant surgery possible
• Here are some of these discoveries

Question 7

Anesthetics

Answer 7

• Before an operation, the patient lies on an operating table in a special room in a hospital called the operating theatre
• The patient is given anesthetic drugs
• Anesthetic drugs make the patient go into a very deep sleep so that he or she cannot feel the pain when the doctor does the operation
• Before anesthetics were discovered, operations were very painful, and often unsuccessful because the patient could not lie still or went into shock.

Question 8

Avoiding infection

Answer 8

• Doctors and nurses have to create a very clean environment in the operating theatre so that the patient’s wound does not get infected
• The doctors and nurses have to cover their heads, their mouths and their hands
• After the operation, patients usually take antibiotics to make sure that the wound does not get infected

Question 9

X-rays

Answer 9

• X-rays are special pictures that show the inside of the body
• The part of the body that is being operated on is usually X-rayed before an operation to plan what needs to happen during the operation
• Doctors also use these X-rays to help them during operations

Question 10

Chris Barnard and the world’s first heart transplant operation

Answer 10

• One Saturday afternoon in December 1967, Professor Christiaan Barnard, from the Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, led a team of doctors and nurses into medical history.
• A man called Louis Washkansky was lying in hospital, dying of heart failure
• A young woman called Denise Darvall had been involved in a horrific car accident, and was not going to survive it. She had a healthy heart
• Prof. Barnard got permission from Denise’s father to use her heart to try and save Louis Washkansky’s life.
• The medical team, led by Prof. Barnard, operated on Denise and Louis to take her heart and transplant it into his body
• The operation was a success, but Louis died 18 days later of a lung infection
• This first heart transplant helped other heart doctors all over the world learn new things, and today, heart transplants are often successful
• Patients live for many years with their new hearts