Transplant Timeline – Bone Marrow Transplants

1956: First Bone Marrow Transplant Using Related Donor (see also 1968): Dr. E. Donnall Thomas of Cooperstown, New York, performs the first successful bone marrow transplant that results in long-term survival of the patient. In 1957 he publishes a report of his work, which shows complete remission of leukemia by treating patients with total body irradiation followed by an infusion of marrow from an identical twin. Along with Joseph E. Murray, Thomas is a co-winner of the 1990 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine "for their discoveries concerning organ and cell transplantation in the treatment of human disease."

1968: First Bone Marrow Transplant Using Related Donor For Non-Cancer Treatment: This event is also advertised as the first bone marrow transplant. Specifically, it is the first bone marrow transplant for non-cancer illness, as the 1956 "first" is for a patient with leukemia. Dr. Robert A. Good performs the first non-cancer BMT on a four-month-old boy who has inherited severe combined immunodeficiency syndrome, an illness that has killed 11 male children in his extended family. The marrow donor is his eight-year-old HLA-matched sister.

1973: First Bone Marrow Transplant Using Unrelated Donor: A team at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City performs the first unrelated bone marrow transplant. The five-year-old patient has severe combined immunodeficiency syndrome, and the donor is found in Denmark through the Blood Bank at Rigshospitalet in Copenhagen. The patient receives multiple infusions of marrow and, after the seventh transplant, hematologic function becomes normal.

1992: Xenotransplant – First Bone Marrow (and Kidney) Transplant from Non-Human Primate: University of Pittsburgh researchers transplant baboon bone marrow and a kidney into a patient. The patient dies 26 days later due to infection.

A more famous baboon bone marrow case is the 1995 transplant on Jeff Getty. In July 1995, scientists receive FDA approval to do the transplant on Getty, who has AIDS, in the hopes that the immune cells in the baboon's marrow would replace those Getty had lost to AIDS (baboon cells are naturally resistant to HIV.) On December 14, 1995, Getty receives two types of cells (immature stem cells and newly discovered facilitator cells) in a procedure performed by Dr. Suzanne Ildstad at San Francisco General Hospital. The cells function only for a brief time. Getty survived almost 11 more years, dying of heart failure on October 9, 2006.

1998: First Combined Liver and Bone Marrow Transplant: Surgeons at King's College Hospital in London, England, perform the first combined liver and bone marrow transplant procedure on 18-year-old Hugo Hennessy, who is suffering from CD40 Ligand Deficiency, which kills 75% of sufferers by age 20.