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Gender Key In Heart Transplants

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 13, 2008

NEW ORLEANS - Turns out men and women really are different at heart: New research finds that heart transplant patients have better odds of survival and a lower risk of rejection if they get organs from donors of the same sex.

Size may be part of the explanation. Men's hearts are bigger than women's and have greater pumping capacity, and men who get men's hearts fare better. But doctors think differences in hormones or immune systems between the sexes may also play a role.

The study was paid for by the federal government and led by Eric Weiss, a cardiac surgery researcher at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. He presented his findings Wednesday at an American Heart Association conference.

Unfortunately for many patients, the findings won't make much of a difference. About 2,700 Americans are waiting for a heart, and only 2,200 heart transplants are done each year - some of them second operations for people whose first transplant failed, according to UNOS, the United Network for Organ Sharing, which manages the nation's transplant system.

The average wait for a heart is 108 days for women and 119 for men. Three-fourths of heart transplants are done in men, so by necessity, many must receive organs from the opposite sex.

The best results were seen in male-to-male transplants. The worst were in men who received hearts from women.

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