child Returns Home After Rare Combined heart And liver transplant At children‘s Hospital Colorado
USA: An 11-year-old girl, Gracie Greenlaw, has returned home and begun recovering after a six-month hospital stay that culminated in a rare combined heart and liver transplantation at children’s Hospital Colorado. Born with hypoplastic left heart syndrome (HLHS) and having undergone multiple open-heart operations, Gracie developed liver failure that made a single-organ transplant insufficient; she became the 37th child in U.S. history to receive both a heart and a liver in one operation.
The family was placed on a dual-organ waiting list and, within weeks, a compatible donor match was identified. After the donor family made the difficult decision to help others, organs were procured and the surgical team moved forward. More than a hundred hospital staff participated in the complex effort, marking the hospital’s first combined heart‑liver transplantation and representing a major coordination of pediatric surgical, critical care, and transplant services.
Surgeons first established circulation to the new liver using a machine that allowed blood to be processed through the graft while the new heart was implanted; the liver was then transplanted soon afterward. The lengthy operation and intensive postoperative care were lifesaving for Gracie, whose doctors say the dual transplant corrected both cardiac and hepatic failure that had threatened her survival.
Now home, Gracie is regaining childhood freedoms — roller skating, dodgeball, and sleepovers — and encouraging other families in similar circumstances to keep fighting and hold onto hope. Her care team and family expressed profound gratitude to the donor’s family for their decision to help, and to the multidisciplinary team at children’s Hospital Colorado whose work made this rare pediatric transplant possible.
Video originally published on 2026-02-25 16:55:10
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