Porcine hearts are helping to save lives! One of the most exciting areas of cardiac research focuses on the use of swine hearts to research, or even help in the prevention of aortic stenosis. From improving outcomes in aortic stenosis to the possibility of full xenotransplants becoming commonplace, pig hearts are helping keep people healthy.
Animal Biotech Industries, Inc.™ is one of the nation’s leading providers of ethically sourced swine tissues, organs, fluids, and other body parts. We provide many of the materials at the center of pig/human heart research, and we’re proud to be doing our part to extend human lives.
The Dangers of Aortic Stenosis
Aortic stenosis is a constriction of the heart’s aortic valve, which is responsible for sending blood from the left ventricle to the aorta. As the valve constricts, the left ventricle must work increasingly hard to keep blood flowing, leading it to become strained and overworked. Ultimately, this ventricle becomes weakened and may even fail, leading to general heart failure.
Aortic stenosis is most commonly caused by calcium buildup within the aortic valve. Overall, up to 300,000 cases of aortic stenosis are reported in America each year.
Currently, the most common treatment is valve replacement surgery, but this is an imperfect cure that leaves significant damage to the left ventricle. Ideally, the heart itself should be healed – and new research out of Spain may hold the key.
New Therapies for Aortic Stenosis
Researchers at Spain’s Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares (CNIC) have been exploring a gene-therapy approach to the prevention of aortic stenosis. They focused on stimulating the beta-3 adrenergic receptor within cardiac cells in rodents. This receptor is common in adipose tissue and other organs but is only weakly expressed in the heart.
Using cultured cardiac tissues treated to overexpress the beta-3 adrenergic receptor, hypertrophic hardening of the tissue was inhibited. From there, they moved to transgenic mice and finally crafted a virus capable of increasing the expression of beta-3 adrenergic receptors within unmodified mice.
The result was mice that were “free of heart failure, and their hearts were metabolically more efficient and consumed less glucose,” according to lead researcher Dr. Andrés Pun. A final test involved injecting the virus into mice already experiencing severe aortic stenosis and heart failure, reversing much of the damage and leading to significantly increased animal survival rates.
What’s next? Porcine hearts. According to the researchers, pigs will be the next research subject. If all goes well, human research will follow.
An Alternative Approach: Nanoparticles
This isn’t the only way that pigs aid in the prevention of aortic stenosis. Another recent study, published in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences, focused on reversing the aortic calcification which leads to stenosis.
The study – conducted on swine – utilized nanoparticles to deliver diethylenetriaminepentaacetic acid (DTPA), as a chelating agent, directly to calcified aortas in the test subjects. This resulted in “significant regression” of the calcification, compared to the control group.
At present, the applications of this research are somewhat limited, as the pig hearts were treated ex vivo. However, it points towards exciting new possibilities in reversing the causes of aortic stenosis.
Replacing Heart Valves with Pig Tissue
Until more research into direct aortic treatment is conducted, doctors will have to rely on the time-tested technique of valve replacement to treat aortic stenosis. Pig heart valves are among the most popular options here, due to similarities between pig hearts and human hearts.
Swine tissue can be treated to prevent rejection, allowing the patient to receive their new valve without requiring anti-rejection medications. For many patients, this makes these valves a better option than artificial valves, which currently require the patient to be on blood thinners for the rest of their lives. Otherwise, the artificial valves may accumulate clots which would block those valves.
However, one drawback is that swine valves tend to have shorter lifespans than artificial valves. Research on long-term survivability is mixed, with both methods bringing benefits and drawbacks.
Pig Heart Transplants In Humans
One other possibility exists: full transplantation of swine hearts into human bodies. In 2022, the first such surgery was performed at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. The procedure was conducted on a 57-year-old male with end-stage heart disease who was ineligible for a human heart transplant. The heart itself was gene-modified, to reduce the chances of rejection and improve its chances of lasting within the human body.
Ultimately, that patient survived for 60 days before dying for reasons that are still being researched. The pig heart began to enlarge, which may be linked to a dormant virus belatedly discovered in the transplanted heart, although that is not certain.
A second swine heart transplant was conducted in September 2023, although in that case, the patient died of heart failure after approximately 40 days. As in the first case, the reasons for this failure are still being researched.
While neither swine heart recipient lived long, it is worth noting that the original recipient of the first human/human heart transplant in 1967 only survived 18 days. Yet, today, thousands of Americans receive heart transplants every year.
These tests are still considered quite promising because, before failure, the patients had regained much of their previous heart function and mobility. Given that the number of people needing transplants far exceeds the supply of human donor hearts, the possibility is high for swine heart transplants to save many lives each year.
Animal Biotech Industries, Inc.™ Enables Life-Saving Research
We are among the most-respected suppliers of post-mortem swine tissue in the US, due to our emphasis on proper harvesting and handling of the materials. Our team of experts can harvest any necessary materials on demand, backed by shipping processes that meet or exceed all best standards. The results are reliable, ethically sourced porcine medical materials ready for use.
If you are seeking pig organs, tissues, fluids, or other materials, we can help. Our experts can also help you determine which swine materials will be best suited for your purposes. Please contact us directly to learn more about our products and services.
