Heart Transplant

Beating Heart Transplant

Find your care

UCLA Health heart transplant patient outcomes are among the best in that nation. Call 310-825-8816(Link opens phone app) to learn more about the Heart Transplant Program.

For information about heart-lung transplants, please call 310-825-6068(Link opens phone app).

Find a Doctor
Request an Appointment
Our Locations

 

Heart In A Box | Debbie Chesebro, Josh Kurz & Shane Winter(Link is external) (Link opens in new window) from Focus Forward Films(Link is external) (Link opens in new window) on Vimeo(Link is external) (Link opens in new window).

Videographer Andrew W. Chan captures his father's experience as a heart transplant recipient using the Organ Transplant System, Heart-in-a-Box.

UCLA leads the way in making more hearts available to save lives. We are working to keep donor hearts healthier, for longer, and to transport donated hearts over greater distances.

We recently led a national, multi-center, phase 2 clinical study(Link is external) (Link opens in new window) of the Organ Care System (OCS), also called "heart in a box" or "beating heart" transplant technology. Learn more about our research and trials.

How "Heart in a Box" Works

"Heart in a box" or "beating heart" technology is an experimental heart transplant organ-preservation system.

The Organ Care System (OCS) lets the donor heart continue functioning outside the body while the heart is being transported. The OCS also keeps the heart healthy by protecting it in an environment that is very similar to conditions inside the body - warm and nourished by blood and oxygen.

The OCS works this way:

  • After a heart is removed from a donor's body, it is placed in a high-tech OCS container, or box.
  • The heart is revived immediately to a beating state. It is perfused (flooded) with oxygen and nutrient-rich blood, and maintained at an appropriate temperature.
  • Monitors on the device report how the heart is functioning during transport.
  • The heart remains warm and beating until transplant.

The OCS has several revolutionary possibilities for heart transplantation:

  • It extends the time for physicians to assess the suitability of a donor heart.
  • The "heart in a box" technology could improve tissue matching between donor hearts and recipients, because the box allows more time to test the heart for potential rejection factors.
  • The OCS box could potentially help expand the donor pool by allowing donor hearts to be safely transported across longer distances. (Current transport methods require donor hearts to be delivered within six hours.)

UCLA also has worked with the developer of the OCS, medical device company TransMedics(Link is external) (Link opens in new window), on "breathing lung" transplant technology.