Advanced Transplant Services

Impending or active failure of a critical organ calls for highly advanced, high-urgency clinical procedures and expertise. CommonSpirit Health International’s™ facility partners include several of the nation’s top programs for transplantation of the heart, kidney, pancreas, liver, and lung. Our board-certified multidisciplinary transplant teams provide comprehensive medical services and surgical therapies to patients from across the U.S. and internationally, from initial counseling to post-transplant medical follow-up.

Heart procedures

Since 1982, Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center in Houston, Texas has been a world-renowned leader in transplant services. Our partnership with Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Heart Institute offers patients access to some of the nation’s most highly trained and skilled physicians. Through our clinical research and rigor, we can discover more methods of prevention and achieve more life-changing breakthroughs, such as:

1stin the U.S. to successfully perform fully robotic heart transplant

1sttotal artificial heart implant
performed in the world


1,500+
LVAD implants in one of the
most experienced centers in the U.S.


1,600+
heart transplants
performed to-date

Kidney and pancreas procedures

The Virginia Mason Medical Center Transplant Center in Seattle, Washington is a leader in kidney and pancreas transplant procedures and the first medical center in the Pacific Northwest to earn designation as a Donor Care Network Center of Excellence by the National Kidney Registry.

Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center is also a leader in this field, with extensive surgical experience that includes laparoscopic nephrectomies with living donors, more than 3,000 kidney transplants performed, and consistently excellent survival rates compared to expected outcomes.

Norton Thoracic Institute, located in Phoenix, Arizona, treats a variety of kidney conditions, including transplants. Over the last year, Norton has treated nearly 50% more kidney cases—reflecting the Institute’s commitment to quality patient care.

Liver procedures

With more than 2,300 liver transplants performed, Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center offers unique surgical expertise of complex hepatobiliary procedures, as well as clinical experience in the management of acute and decompensated chronic liver failure.

2,300+
liver transplants performed
to-date

Lung Procedures

The programs of Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center and Norton Thoracic Institute reflect a wide margin of national leadership in both number of lung transplants and speed of access to donor organs:

  • Performing more than 200 transplants from deceased donors annually, more than any other organization in the U.S.
  • The percentage of patients receiving a transplant in 30 days or less at these facilities averages 56.69, compared to a national percentage of 37.58.
  • In 2025, the average wait time to receive a lung transplant was two weeks, which is significantly below the national average.

What began as a lung transplant center 20 years ago is now the Norton Thoracic Institute, located in Phoenix, Arizona, internationally regarded as a leader in care. When other international health institutions have turned patients away, Norton has risen to the challenge, once performing three lung transplants in 12 hours, one of which only had three hours’ notice. Norton maintains a high case mix, reflecting their capabilities in treating cases with greater complexity.

“Double” double lung transplant gives international patient second chance

“I was in the hospital for three weeks, and two months later I was back in Mexico. Now I feel perfect, better than when I was 20 years old!”
– Gabriel Gonzalez Chavez

For 14 years, Gabriel Gonzalez Chavez suffered from a lung condition called hypersensitivity pneumonitis which causes lung scarring, shortness of breath, and poor quality of life. It began with a cough that did not respond to medication. Gabriel tried immunosuppressants for years to no avail. He even moved from his home in Mexico City to Cancun so he could breathe more easily at sea level. Still, the condition continued to damage his lungs and he needed a double lung transplant.

At 50 years of age, Gabriel turned to the lung transplant program at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center. The hospital has one of the top lung transplant programs in the country, performing more than 100 transplants in 2024.

The International Services program at Baylor St. Luke’s assisted Gabriel with gathering the necessary documentation, medical records, and travel arrangements so he could be admitted as soon as possible.

Gabriel was on oxygen when he arrived in Houston in August 2022. Dr. Ramiro Fernandez II, a thoracic surgeon at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center and Assistant Professor of Surgery at Baylor College of Medicine, performed the double lung transplant two months later.

The surgery went well and Gabriel was back home in just two weeks. However, in the ensuing months, he developed diffuse bilateral airway stenosis, a rare narrowing of the airways in both lungs. He became so sick he was admitted to ICU and placed on a ventilator.

Gabriel was in good hands. Baylor St. Luke’s has an excellent reputation in the field of high-risk transplant surgeries. “We have a very experienced team of surgeons, pulmonologists, and an ICU care team that can manage these kinds of rare cases. We’re prepared to handle any sort of complication with good outcomes,” Dr. Fernandez said.

“Diffuse bilateral airway stenosis is a very unusual complication, very rarely described in the literature,” Dr. Fernandez said. The hospital’s advanced interventional pulmonology team performed several dilations and stent placements to open his airway but the condition was too severe.

The condition progressed to the point that another lung transplant was his only option. Gabriel underwent a bilateral lung transplant performed by Thoracic Surgeon Gabriel Loor, Associate Professor of Surgery, Cardiothoracic Transplant & Circulatory Support at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center.

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