rainer gruessner - groundbreaking contributions
Post on 14-Aug-2015
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Giving Children Another Chance at Life
Rainer Gruessner
For Rainer Gruessner, giving
children another chance at life is
a primary motivation for his
development of groundbreaking
contributions to the medical field.
One of these contributions
includes successful bowel
transplantation in pediatric
patients.
In 1998, Dr. Gruessner transplanted six
feet of small bowel from a father to his
son. The 16-year old boy had lost all of
his small bowel as a result of a car
accident two years prior. At the time of
the accident, the teenage patient was
unable to digest food properly, forcing
him to receive intravenous feeding or
total parenteral nutrition (TPN).
Instead of receiving the bowel from
a living donor, Dr. Gruessner
instead used three organs of a
deceased infant, allowing the young
patient to receive a liver and
pancreas in addition to the small
bowel. This three organ transplant
was the first of its kind in Arizona
and the Southwestern United
States.
The patient is no longer on TPN and is
capable of digesting food. Her quality of
life is markedly improved and she is
growing up like a “normal” child. The
procedure was just as important to the
University Medical Center in Tucson:
patients who previously required such
transplants were forced to travel to
Nebraska or to Miami to receive
treatment.
http://www.slideshare.net/DrRainerGruessner
https://drrainergruessner.wordpress.com/
https://www.healthgrades.com/physician/dr-rainer-gruessner-3mlnr
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