Little Owen’s Big Milestone: The Piece of Heart Transplanted to Cure His Heart Failure Has Grown Along with Him

This article highlights the first partial heart transplant in a newborn who was born with persistent truncus arteriosus and irreparable truncal valve dysfunction. This condition remains an issue due to the lack of implantable heart valves that can grow with the patient, and therefore patients require recurrent implant exchanges until adulthood.

The team at Duke have also published the case in JAMA, detailing the first case of a partial heart transplant through implantation of growing heart valves. The authors report a good outcome at one year.