Honoring the ‘Miracle Days’ of Transplant Patients

It was an anniversary party to remember for the Stanford Medicine Children’s Health Pediatric Transplant Center. Former patients and their families traveled from all over California to celebrate 50 years of pediatric heart transplants and 35 years of pediatric lung transplants at Stanford.

More than a dozen families who have been touched by the gift of organ donation joined the celebration. Some recently had their transplants, but others, like Salvador Rodriguez, who is now an adult, reunited with his care team, telling them he’s had his heart for 17 years now.

“It is hard to believe we performed our first pediatric heart transplant at Stanford on August 19, 1974,” says Seth Hollander, MD, medical director of heart transplantation. “Since then, we have performed 568 heart transplants in 540 different patients. I think of every day after heart transplant as a gift, or as I call them, ‘miracle days.’ On August 19 of this year, we will have provided 1,731,517 miracle days to pediatric heart transplant patients. We are so grateful and so honored that you have entrusted us to care for your families.”

Transplant patients and their siblings enjoyed a magic show, face painting, and balloon swords. The event culminated in a resolution from the California State Legislature recognizing the achievement and decades of giving another chance at life to young patients.

“As I look around and see all these kids, I see a whole world of possibility and potential,” says David Cornfield, MD, chief of the Pulmonary, Asthma, and Sleep Medicine Center. “Transplant is a tremendous gift that is encapsulated in each person and family. What today represents to me is the whole notion that transplant allows us to replace deep anguish and fear with the light and warmth of hope. I look forward to sharing many more hopeful moments with many of you and those we have not met.”