Lanka's first lung transplant, a success

A team of doctors from Okayama University Hospital successfully conducted Sri Lanka's first lung transplant last week. The operation took place at a hospital in Colombo on a Sri Lankan man in his 60s and lasted some 11 hours, it said.

The man, who has lung fibrosis, a disease that causes breathing difficulties due to lung inflammation, received lungs from a brain-dead donor.The team, led by Takahiro Oto, a respiratory surgeon and associate professor at the university, initially planned to transplant parts of the lungs from two living donors before a transplant from a brain-dead donor became available. A local medical team also joined the operation.

- Kyodo News