Congressman Receives Rare Double-Lung Transplant
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JACKSON, Miss. — Surgeons performed a rare double-lung transplant Saturday on U.S. Rep. Floyd Spence (R-S.C.), and a spokeswoman at the University of Mississippi Medical Center said the 60-year-old congressman was in critical but stable condition after the five-hour surgery ended.
Spence, suffering from chronic obstructive lung disease, flew to Mississippi on Friday afternoon from Columbia, S.C., after being notified of a possible set of donor lungs in Texas. He appeared alert and in good spirits as he was wheeled into the hospital.
At one point last October, Spence was put under intensive care at Bethesda Naval Medical Center in Maryland in critical condition. Afterward, he went on the list of potential organ transplant recipients.
Double-lung transplants have been performed 30 times worldwide and only 12 times in North America, officials said.
Dr. Sesshadri Raju, professor of surgery and director of the transplant program at Jackson, said he believed Spence should be fully recovered before November, when he is up for reelection. Before the surgery, he had said Spence would be able to resume a normal schedule after six months with “surprisingly” few physical restrictions.
Confined at times to a wheelchair and occasionally in need of oxygen, Spence has made few public appearances since October.
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