Study: Heart Transplants Between Ages 60 and 70 Yield Good Results

Heart transplant recipients who get their new heart between the ages of 60 and 70 do as well as, and sometimes better than, those who get transplants at a younger age, according to Stanford University researchers.

Dr. Philippe Demers, reporting at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress in Edmonton on a study of 82 patients who received new hearts between ages 60 and 70, said 73 percent were still alive after five years compared to an average 68 percent five-year survival rate for younger patients.

He added that the older transplant patients were not hospitalized longer after surgery, and had fewer rejection episodes, and said opportunistic infections and lymphomas were no more frequent.

Demers told the Edmonton Journal that his findings point to the importance of physiological age as well as chronological age. and said the key to transplant success in people over 60 is careful patient selection.

"This doesn't mean it should be done on all patients with heart failure between 60 and 70," he said. "But I believe that in a patient with no other major health problems, heart transplants are a good alternative."

Other sources: Canadian Cardiovascular Congress, Edmonton Journal