Baylor Regional Transplant Institute

Baylor's transplant program was established in 1984. Today it is one of the nation's top transplant programs. Since its inception, the transplant centers have performed more than 8,000 solid organ transplants, including liver, kidney, pancreas, heart and lung, as well as blood and marrow transplants. Physicians currently participate in more than 85 research protocols and, through Baylor's transplant research program, many of the researched drugs now are used as standard therapy.

Baylor also offers transplant patients organ-specific support groups and furnished apartments, known as the Twice Blessed House, at a nominal fee for short and long-term stays. With a continued focus on medical education, surgeons on staff at Baylor have trained more than 35 transplant fellows who now lead transplant programs around the world. Baylor's training program for liver and kidney transplantation is approved by the American Society of Transplant Surgeons. Baylor Regional Transplant Institute is the integration of transplant services at Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas and Baylor All Saints Medical Center at Fort Worth.

Liver, Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation
Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas
Baylor Dallas performs all types of abdominal transplants, most frequently liver and kidney transplants, as well as combined kidney/pancreas transplants, intestinal transplants, split liver transplants and living donor transplants in adult and pediatric patients. Baylor is one of the four largest adult liver transplant centers in the nation. In 2006, Baylor Dallas was the first in the Southwest to be approved by the American Society of Transplant Surgeons as a surgical training program in pancreas transplantation.

Survival rates for Baylor liver and kidney transplant recipients exceed the national average as published by the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS). In 1995, the Dallas Liver Transplant Program, a collaboration between Baylor, Children's Medical Center of Dallas and UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, was established to provide comprehensive services for children and adults.

Baylor All Saints Medical Center at Fort Worth
In July 2002, Baylor Regional Transplant Institute expanded its liver, kidney and pancreas transplant program to Baylor All Saints Medical Center at Fort Worth. The medical center is staffed with full-time transplant surgeons, transplant physicians, transplant nurses and other multidisciplinary team members. Physicians have performed more than 270 transplants since the program's inception. Survival rates for Baylor All Saints liver and kidney transplant recipients exceed the national average as published by UNOS. In 2003, Baylor All Saints launched Tarrant County's first pancreas transplant program, and in 2006, the medical center recruited a renowned islet cell transplant researcher.

Heart and Lung Transplantation
The Baylor/UT Southwestern Heart and Lung Transplant Program performs heart, single lung, double lung and a small number of combined heart/lung and heart/kidney transplants at Baylor Dallas. Baylor utilizes advanced technology in ventricular assist devices as a bridge to transplant for critically ill heart patients. Baylor continues to grow its clinical research program and review protocols that improve treatment for its patients. One-year survival rates for heart and lung transplant patients exceed the national average as published by UNOS.

Blood and Marrow Transplantation
Through the blood and marrow transplant program at Baylor Dallas, physicians perform autologous and allogeneic-related and unrelated transplants. Physicians treat patients with leukemias, lymphomas, aplastic anemia, multiple myeloma and other cancers through the blood and marrow transplant program, and participate in clinical trials. Baylor is one of eight programs in the nation that operates all four components of the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP), including donation, collection and transplantation. The NMDP maintains a registry of 6.2 million volunteers who are willing to donate their stem cells to patients in need. Baylor's blood and marrow transplant program is among the top centers in volume of unrelated donor transplants out of 166 NMDP transplant centers, and has survival rates equivalent to the national average. The program also was among the first in the United States to receive initial accreditation by the Foundation for the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy and holds the distinguished classification Center of Excellence.

Highlights
Islet Cell Transplantation Research
Nationwide, more than one million people have Type I (juvenile onset) diabetes. Diabetes (Type 1 and Type 2) accounts for more than 25,000 people on the kidney transplant waiting list in the United States. Islet cell transplantation entails removing islet cells from a cadaver donor pancreas in a laboratory and injecting the cells into the liver of a Type I diabetes patient who is otherwise healthy. Investigators observe that the islet cells anchor in the liver, where they receive blood and nutrients and can be shown to be producing insulin. Currently, physicians on staff at Baylor have performed seven islet cell transplants. As a result of the transplant, all patients have shown improvements in their blood sugar control, and one patient was able to be weaned from insulin completely for a period of several weeks.

Intestinal Transplantation
Baylor Dallas was the first transplant center in Texas to successfully perform an intestinal transplant in 2005. The patient, a 22-year-old woman, could not eat or digest food and was left to rely solely on intravenous fluids for nutrition. Today, she is healthy, enjoying solid food and back to living a normal life. Historically, anti-rejection medications have not had as much success in intestinal transplant patients as in other organ transplant recipients, but because of advances in the drugs, doctors are able to better control rejection.

Transplant Immunology Research
Investigators at Baylor are studying the manipulation of immune system functions to improve the acceptance of transplanted organs. Maintaining a fine balance when suppressing the immune system is critical. The body must control organ rejection yet still fight illness and disease. By reducing rejection and developing better and safer techniques to fight rejection, organs may last longer, quality of life for the recipient may improve and the high cost of transplantation may decrease. Investigators also hope to precondition a potential organ recipient to fully tolerate the transplanted organ before it is surgically placed in the recipient's body.

Microarray Technology
To recognize which patients have developed immunotolerance, Baylor scientists are utilizing microarray technology, which was developed through Baylor's research on cancer and autoimmunity. Using a single drop of blood from a patient, the microarray machine scans 50,000 different genes and shows their activity. Baylor scientists have identified different patterns or signatures that correspond to specific disease processes, infections and allergic responses. Through microarrays, scientists may be able to identify infections before they develop, recognize certain cancers before symptoms arise and determine whether a patient is rejecting a transplanted organ or is tolerating it. This may enable scientists to identify those patients who will probably not need immunosuppressive drugs.