jordan pulse -

​By Dr. Jamal Al-Dabbas
​In 1985, Jordan transplanted a heart.
​Imagine that: more than forty years ago, at a time when heart transplantation was among the most complex achievements of medicine, Jordan was able to find the donor, possess the team, the decision, and the capabilities, and complete the procedure.
​Then it advanced further, performing a simultaneous heart and lung transplant in 1997, in a pioneering achievement for the region.
​Then the program stopped.
​Here lies the question that is difficult to bypass: if we were able to do that more than forty years ago, why can't we today build a sustainable national heart transplant program?
​Since that time, medicine has developed amazingly. Surgery, intensive care, immunology, imaging, organ preservation, and transport have become more advanced, and we now have greater Jordanian expertise inside the Kingdom and abroad.
​Even society itself is supposed to have become more aware.
​For the society that was able to donate organs in 1985 is supposed to be more aware after four decades, not less.
​The problem, then, is not in a surgeon's ability to transplant a heart.
​Heart transplantation requires a state and a system: clear legislation, organ donation, an organized diagnosis of brain death, a national registry and waiting lists, coordination among hospitals, organ transport teams, immunology laboratories, specialized care, funding, and long-term follow-up.
​And here is the difference between an achievement we once, and an institution that creates achievement every time.
​We in the Jordanian Society of Cardiologists, together with our Jordanian colleagues at home and abroad, are trying to bring this issue back to the forefront and benefit from the vast Jordanian expertise around the world. However, professional initiatives alone are not enough.
​We need a national institutional will that adopts the project and guarantees its continuity, regardless of changes in individuals and administrations.
​After more than forty years, the question is no longer: Can Jordanians transplant a heart?
​They have done it.
​The harder question: Can we build a system that does not stop after succeeding?
​And here, perhaps, lies the entire issue.
​Source: Rum News Agency