Posted on: Tuesday, July 9, 2002

St. Francis organ transplant team lauded for success

By Shayna Coleon
Advertiser Staff writer

The St. Francis Medical Center in Nu'uanu recognized its organ transplant team of doctors and nurses yesterday for having a higher patient survivor rate than many other medical centers in the nation.

Patients at the St. Francis Transplant Institute of the Pacific, the only transplant program in the state, had an equal or better chance of survival than patients in other transplant centers, according to a yearly report that studied the 255 medical institutions that operate organ transplant programs nationwide.

The report, released in May, was by the United Network of Organ Sharing, a nonprofit group that maintains the nation's organ transplant waiting list for the Department of Health and Human Services, and works to match those needing transplants with donor families.

The St. Francis transplant institute performs heart, liver, pancreas, kidney, kidney-pancreas and bone marrow transplants.

The report said all of St. Francis' 30 adult kidney-pancreas transplant patients survived one year after surgery for a 100 percent survival rate, while the national average survival rate was 95.2 percent.

St. Francis, one of 239 medical centers that perform kidney transplants, completed 800 kidney transplants and equaled the national average of one-year survival for adults with kidney transplant programs at 95 percent.

Dr. Livingston Wong, medical director of the St. Francis Transplant Institute who started the program in 1969 after performing the first kidney transplant in Hawai'i, said he is pleased with its progress.

"It's tedious work," Wong said. "But I think it's worth it when you see your patient ready to die, and then they walk out of the hospital after you're done. It's that satisfaction that you had a part in that."

Wong said the institute's biggest challenge is finding organ donors.

In Hawai'i, more than 300 people are waiting for an organ transplant, Wong said. Nationally, 79,641 people are waiting, according to the United Network of Organ Sharing.

"There are people waiting or dying while waiting," Wong said. "So, I don't think it's important to receive such recognition, but more important to look at how many transplant patients we have, and how many more could donate their organs."