Temple applies to restart transplant programs

Temple University Hospital announced Thursday that it had applied to reactivate its heart- and lung-transplant programs, which it stopped earlier this year, and that it had hired a transplant surgeon from the University of Pittsburgh.

The hospital inactivated its heart-transplant program in July because of low patient volume. It stopped doing lung transplants in May after the departure of its primary lung-transplant surgeon.

Temple's heart-transplant program had been averaging five procedures a year, half the number required to meet federal quality standards. The Pennsylvania Department of Health had said the lung program had lower-than-expected survival rates.

Temple said it applied to the United Network for Organ Sharing to reactivate the programs last month. That process could take several months, said T. Sloan Guy, chief of cardiothoracic surgery.

Guy, who started at Temple six months ago, said the hospital was "reengineering" its transplant programs while it waits for approval. He declined to say how many transplants he wants the hospital to do, but he said, "We don't want to be a low-volume program."

Yoshiya Toyoda, 46, began work at Temple two months ago. He is vice chief of cardiothoracic surgery, surgical director of heart and lung transplantation, and surgical director of mechanical circulatory support. He had been division chief of cardiothoracic transplantation at the University of Pittsburgh, which has a more robust program.

Temple said Toyoda had performed more than 450 heart, lung, and heart-lung transplants in the last eight years.

Guy described Toyoda as "one of the country's best transplant surgeons."

Toyoda received his training at Kobe University School of Medicine in Japan.

The hospital did not make Toyoda available to speak to a reporter Thursday.