Guinness World Records: Patient with longest survival after heart transplantation

The person who has lived the longest after getting a new heart has been given an award by Guinness World Records.

Bert Janssen, who is 57 years old and from the Netherlands, has been living for almost 40 years with the heart he got from a donor at Harefield Hospital in Uxbridge, north-west London, in the 1980s.

He was being treated for a heart condition that makes it hard for the heart to pump blood.

He said he was “very thankful for the amazing gift” his donor gave him.

Mr Janssen found out he had heart muscle disease after he got sick with symptoms like the flu at 17.

His heart doctor in his country knew the doctors at Harefield Hospital and the person who started doing heart transplants, Prof Sir Magdi Yacoub. Prof Sir Magdi Yacoub did the surgery on 6 June 1984.

The operation didn’t happen in the Netherlands yet. Mr Janssen, who was 18 when he had the operation, said: “It all happened very quickly. Just one week after coming to Harefield, two hearts became available from a big car crash in London.

“I had surgery where they replaced my heart with someone else’s. ”

Mr Janssen said that he was able to go back to feeling good after the surgery.

The man is happy to have broken the record for air gliding. He is also a husband and has two children. He feels proud.

“He said he never thought he would come this far. ”

I believe the most important thing is to be a good example for others to follow. It has been proven that it is possible to go this far with a donated heart.

“I think the marker will continue to move even more, and I will be happy if someone else breaks my record eventually. ”

He was the 107th person to have a transplant at Harefield Hospital.

Sir Magdi performed the first transplant in 1980, and the center has done thousands more since then. In 2022-23, 54 transplants were completed.

Dr Fernando Riesgo Gil, a heart specialist at Harefield Hospital, said he is happy to hear that one of their first heart transplant patients is still living a good and happy life many years after the transplant.

Last week, there were 7,314 adults and 248 kids waiting for a transplant in the UK. This information is from the NHS Blood and Transplant website.

Out of all of them, 334 people are waiting for hearts.