Infant Gets Heart Month After Cancellation
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TRENTON, N.J. — A 10-week-old boy received a new heart Saturday, a month after officials canceled his first transplant operation because the organ donor had died of sudden infant death syndrome.
Gregory Brown was listed in serious but stable condition after the surgery at St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children in Philadelphia, officials said.
The baby had been readied for a transplant on March 3. But the surgery fell through because the New Jersey medical examiner’s office, reversing an earlier decision, refused to release the organs of the intended donor, 3-month-old Ryan Anthony Pacelli.
Two other critically ill babies also were prepared to receive organs from Ryan. Their surgeries also were canceled.
The medical examiner’s office said it would not release Ryan’s organs because doctors still do not know what causes SIDS.
One of the other two infants later received a lung transplant and is recovering, a spokeswoman for the New Jersey Organ and Tissue Sharing Network said.
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