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Forty years ago today legendary surgeon Professor Sir Magdi Yacoub carried out the UK\u2019s first heart and lung transplant, saving the life of Swedish journalist Lars Ljungberg who had approached the surgeon \u2013 already famed for his heart transplants \u2013 as his last hope.<\/p>\n
Experts in the United States had refused to operate as they felt Mr Ljungberg\u2019s organs had deteriorated too far. And although, sadly, he died 13 days later of an underlying condition, the pioneering operation itself was a success and paved the way for thousands of life-saving transplants to follow.<\/p>\n
\u201cMr Ljungberg was a wonderful man, very determined and intelligent, who came to Harefield Hospital and said, \u2018It\u2019s my last chance, what do I do now?\u2019 I, for one, always feel you should have empathy with your patients, so we talked it over and I explained that it was a high-risk operation.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a last chance, but a chance is a chance and I told him we were willing to give him that chance and, at the same time, it was very important that the operation should be established anyway. He was very motivated and happy to accept the risk, and said, \u2018If I don\u2019t make it, please play Mozart\u2019s Requiem at my funeral, I will appreciate it.\u2019 He was accepting, and very grateful we took him on. It proved to be a landmark operation which benefited many thousands of people.\u201d<\/p>\n
To date, more than 3,500 people have received dual heart and lung transplants at Harefield, where Professor Yacoub, now 88, developed the procedure in 1983.<\/p>\n
He reveals to the Daily Express that he was on \u201cauto-pilot\u201d for the duration of the operation having already carried it out \u201chundreds of times\u201d in his head while awake and as he slept.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is not a sleepless night. I do go to sleep, but my brain is so focused on the idea, which I have first cut into its component parts, that my subconscious continues to try to solve the problem,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I got into the surgery it was actually very quick because the link between the hand and the brain is so well coordinated in my mind that I didn\u2019t hesitate.\u201d<\/p>\n
Prior to this, he had introduced modifications to heart transplant surgery that proved to be the bedrock of this more complex operation.<\/p>\n
\u201cI try very hard to equip myself with as much knowledge and skill as I can. Sir Russell Brock [the surgeon at Guy\u2019s Hospital who he trained under], said that people think heart surgery is glamorous,\u201d he recalls.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is actually very hard work. You have to be dedicated.<\/p>\n
Don’t miss… <\/strong> \u201cAnd once you start an operation you have to stop being about emotion \u2013 even though you love this patient and their family \u2013 and concentrate completely.<\/p>\n \u201cYou become almost automatically fixed, like a machine, without emotion. During the operation, you have to be dedicated to the patient and think about nothing else beyond making what you are doing successful.<\/p>\n \u201cSome people think surgeons are doing it for their own glory, but you are doing it for the sake of the patient who has nowhere else to go.\u201d<\/p>\n Professor Yacoub tells me there were approximately 20 colleagues with him that day, each with an important role to play. The complex operation was actually in two parts: taking the existing organs out and putting the new organs in.<\/p>\n \u201cThe surgery itself was quite quick, but we don\u2019t finish or give the reverse anticoagulation drugs [to help the blood clot] until we are absolutely sure [the patient is stable].\u201d<\/p>\n So how does this humble, yet eminent surgeon balance holding someone\u2019s life in his hands? He insists the responsibility is eased by the knowledge that, without his intervention, the patient has no future. \u201cYou are just a doctor trying to do your best.\u201d<\/p>\n A biography of this giant of medicine has now been published to coincide with the momentous anniversary of the operation. Professor Yacoub began the transplant programme at Harefield Hospital in 1980 with Derrick Morris, who became Europe\u2019s longest-surviving heart transplant patient until his death, aged 75, in July 2005.<\/p>\n Two years later, he performed a heart transplant on John McCafferty, who survived for more than 33 years, until February 10, 2016, and was recognised as the world\u2019s longest-surviving heart transplant patient by Guinness World Records in 2013.<\/p>\n Both these pioneering operations were the building blocks for the more complex heart and lung transplant surgery he was to pioneer in the UK.<\/p>\n Although he retired from the NHS in 2001, his charity, Chain of Hope, is bringing his brand of life-giving medicine to those with nothing. It creates hospitals offering free healthcare in Egypt, Rwanda and Ethiopia. In the process, this giant among cardiovascular surgeons, whose wife Marianne passed away from cancer aged 71 in 2011, is providing a knowledge exchange programme to pass on his expertise.<\/p>\n He says: \u201cA major part of my life right now is trying to present to humanity everything I have learned, with an element of continuity and sustainability.\u201d<\/p>\n Born in Egypt on November 16, 1935, Professor Yacoub was inspired to become a surgeon after the death of his youngest aunt in childbirth from an undiagnosed heart valve issue that is particularly dangerous in pregnancy. In fact, he tells me he was only \u201cfive or six years old\u201d when she died.<\/p>\n \u201cIt affected me because I saw my father having a nervous breakdown, and saying, \u2018I lost my darling sister to a preventable cause\u2019.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd I said, \u2018Don\u2019t worry Dad, I will find a solution\u2019. He told me about a Mr Brock who was working out how, and that he was in the UK.<\/p>\n \u201cI told him I would study under him one day, and in fact I came the UK [in the early 1960s] and I did.\u201d As the young Magdi had matured, his father Habib \u2013 also a surgeon \u2013 continued to shape his son for this important future work.<\/p>\n \u201cHe said, \u2018You are a bit disorganised and haven\u2019t got what it takes to achieve all that.\u2019 So I got really determined to correct The professor has three children \u2013 pilot Andrew, 54, Lisa, 52, a charity manager, and doctor Sophie, 48.<\/p>\n But it is also the heart itself that inspires his work. \u201cI am totally in love with the heart,\u201d he says with feeling.<\/p>\n \u201cFor one, unlike neurological disease, if you do something to the heart you see a result immediately. The other thing is that I have major respect for an organ that goes on silently beating, millions of times, without bothering anyone or making a fuss. Each heart has a personality; you need to know when you are dealing with its particulars.<\/p>\n \u201cMany people, including me, thought it was just a pump. But it has now been discovered that it is an endocrine organ, connected to the brain by many nerves, that affects the function of the brain, and is influenced by the brain. The heart has a massive influence on our personalities.\u201d<\/p>\n
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that and equip myself to try. He was a huge influence.\u201d<\/p>\n\n