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The patient has suffered from cystic fibrosis since birth, a chronic disease that reduces the quality of life of those who suffer from it, as it produces an abnormal amount of mucus that causes lung and digestive problems.
Mireia Sitjà, a 24-year-old young woman, has been the first Spanish patient to receive three double lung transplants, all of them in less than six years and at the Vall d'Hebron Hospital in Barcelona, the center that has carried out the most lung retransplants in Spain.
In a press conference held this Friday, the patient explained that has suffered from cystic fibrosis since birth, a chronic disease that reduces the quality of life of those who suffer from it, since it produces an abnormal amount of mucus that causes lung and digestive problems.
Three years later, in 2019, the patient returned to the operating room to receive a retransplant of both lungs because those transplanted in 2016 had a degree of dysfunction, a chronic rejection reaction by the patient's body's defenses.
"My body and my defenses stopped tolerating the transplanted lungs and I relapsed, I felt that constant feeling of exhaustion and shortness of breath that prevented me from leading a normal life," explained Mireia Sitjà.
The Head of the Thoracic Surgery and Lung Transplant Service of Vall d'Hebron, Alberto Jauregui, has pointed out that chronic rejection is a possibility that can occur in the years after the lung transplant operation and is the main cause of retransplantation.
The patient reported that, after the first retransplant, in December 2020 she once again felt some respiratory failure, but it was not until August 2021 when his quality of life was totally affected.
The exhaustion was such that the doctors decided to admit her for a week in August to do tests and thus save her trips to the hospital.
"Putting on my socks or putting on my socks was like doing a marathon., it was impossible for me. At that moment they gave me oxygen and I didn't leave the house from August to December because I couldn't even walk," the young woman recalled.
At the end of 2021, she underwent a second double-lung retransplant (and third transplant) in Vall d'Hebron, after again suffering a chronic rejection to the transplanted lungs.
After the last operation, Mireia Sitjà has become the first patient in Spain to receive external lungs three times.
"Before carrying it out, the medical team requested an assessment of the case by the Vall d'Hebron Lung Transplant Committee and the National Transplant Organization," explained Jauregui.
The Head of the Thoracic Surgery and Lung Transplant Service has also emphasized that carrying out a retransplant is a very complicated operation for both the medical team and the patient and carries significant risks.
The patient, who was informed of all the risks, decided to undergo the operation "without hesitation" because "she felt very ill and considered that it was worth the risk to have a better life."
On the other hand, the surgeon from the Thoracic Surgery and Lung Transplant Service Laura Romero, who was also in the operating room for the young woman's last retransplant, has highlighted that the requirements to opt for said surgery are specific and the patients are selected minutely.
"To access the two-lung retransplant, the patient must have the lung as the only vital organ affected and, in addition, she must be young, since it is a very complicated operation and an older person would not be able to endure it," Romero stressed.
According to Dr. Romero and Dr. Jauregui, currently the patient, whom they have described as "fighter and with an exemplary spirit", he feels "very well", he left the hospital a week ago and has already been able to return to his normal life, although going to rehabilitation and without making any efforts.
Sitjà, for her part, stressed that she is "very happy and grateful" to all the Vall d'Hebron staff who have cared for her these weeks but she is happy to have returned home, because, among other things, He has been able to continue studying Japanese and Korean and has returned to dancing, something he loves to do.
Vall d'Hebron, record of retransplants in Spain
Vall d'Hebron is one of the seven centers in Spain that carries out lung retransplants, according to the National Transplant Organization (ONT).
In the last decade 82 lung retransplants have been performed in Spain, of which Vall d'Hebron has executed 26, that is, 31,7% of the total.
Source: Heraldo de Aragón
