For people with advanced heart failure, a heart transplant is a lifesaving gift. Nearly 4,000 people in the U.S. receive a new heart each year.
The Penn Medicine Heart Transplant Program is among the nation's most experienced. We provide exceptional care and support across your heart transplant journey to help you achieve your best life.
What Is a Heart Transplant?
A heart transplant is an open-chest surgical procedure that replaces your heart with a healthy heart from a deceased donor. For most people, heart transplantation is highly successful. Nationwide, over 90 percent of people survive at least one year after transplant. Your Penn transplant team provides leading-edge care to help you have a positive transplant outcome.
A heart transplant usually involves only the heart. Rarely, a person may need something called a dual-organ transplant, a multi-organ procedure that replaces more than one diseased organ during the same surgery. At the Penn Transplant Institute, our transplant teams coordinate closely to perform:
- Heart-kidney transplants
- Heart-liver transplants
- Heart-lung transplants
Why Might Someone Need a Heart Transplant?
The main reason for a heart transplant is advanced heart failure, in which the heart muscle becomes thick or stiff and cannot pump blood effectively. When treatments for heart failure are unsuccessful, your doctor may recommend heart transplantation. End-stage heart failure may be caused by or related to:
Penn Heart Failure Program specialists are skilled in treating all types of heart failure that may lead to heart transplant.
Heart Transplant: What to Expect
There are four major stages in the heart transplant process:
- Evaluation: We perform a comprehensive evaluation to determine your eligibility. Over a few days you receive blood and imaging tests and meet with our specialists. Our team evaluates the information and determines if you meet the criteria for heart transplant. Learn more about heart transplant evaluation.
- Waiting list: If we find that you are eligible for a heart transplant and you decide transplant is right for you, we add you to the national waiting list. We know waiting can be stressful. Our extensive support services can help you and your family cope while you wait. Read more about the heart transplant waiting list.
- Surgery: When a donor heart becomes available, we act quickly. We send a team to retrieve the heart and prepare you for surgery. Find out how our expert surgeons perform heart transplant surgery.
- Recovery and follow-up care: Recovery starts the moment you leave surgery. From the intensive care unit to discharge and beyond, you are part of the Penn transplant family. You receive personal, lifelong care to help you be healthy and active. See more information about heart transplant recovery.
Your Heart Transplant Team
Your Penn Medicine heart transplant team includes professionals from many disciplines. You receive care from highly trained doctors, including:
- Cardiologists: Evaluate you for transplant and manage your care after
- Cardiac surgeons: Perform heart transplant surgery
- Cardiac anesthesiologists: Make sure you are asleep during surgery and manage your care in the intensive care unit
- Transplant infectious disease specialists: Treat infectious diseases that are more common and severe in people who have received a transplant
- Intensive care providers: Care for you immediately after surgery in the intensive care unit
We also have access to doctors across the Penn Medicine system, should any issues arise. Specialties we frequently draw upon to help treat heart transplant patients include endocrinology, pulmonology, hematology, gastroenterology and nephrology.
In addition, your care team includes:
- Advanced practice providers: Provide care before and after surgery
- Nurses: Assist with and coordinate all aspects of your care
- Social workers: Help you manage social or emotional issues that arise at any point during the transplant process
- Financial counselors: Assess your insurance and estimate your out-of-pocket transplant costs
- Nutritionists: Evaluate your diet and make recommendations to help you heal faster
- Pharmacists: Manage your medications, including immunosuppression medications to prevent organ rejection
- Physical therapists: Help you regain movement and strength after surgery
Heart Transplant Program: Why Choose Penn Medicine?
At Penn Medicine, we provide care that is second-to-none. We have experience evaluating high-risk patients and providing heart transplants — even when other centers say surgery isn't an option.
When you seek care at Penn, you'll find:
- Deep experience: We are one of the nation's most experienced heart transplant programs. Our surgeons perform an average of one heart transplant each week. Since the program began in 1987, we've performed more than 1,500 transplants.
- Innovative research: Penn Medicine is a world-class institution at the leading edge of research for advanced heart failure and transplant. Our physician-researchers are working to reduce the risk of rejection and identify new ways to increase the pool of available organs. Learn more about heart transplant research and clinical trials.
- Family-centered approach: Our modern facilities offer a family-centered model of care you won't find at other hospitals. Family members can remain at your bedside and participate in care-team meetings.
- Coordinated care: Our nurse coordinators and social work team are your main points of contact. They manage your care throughout the transplant process and support you for the rest of your life. As a transplant recipient, become part of the Penn family.
Make an Appointment
Please call 800-789-7366 or request a callback.