The Landmark 1954 Kidney Transplant: A History

Successful kidney transplant between identical twins

In late 1954, the breakthrough that occurred in the field of organ transplant was the successful transplant of kidney between identical twins named Ronald Lee Herrick and his brother Richard Lee Herrick.

The transplantation surgery was performed on December 23, 1954 by Joseph E. Murray at the Beth Israel Hospital (Now Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center), one of the Harvard Medical School's main teaching hospital situated in Boston, Massachusetts.

This significant operation marked a monumental medical milestone ,demonstrating the possibility of successful organtransplantations using organs from a living donor without immediate immune rejection thanks to genetic comptability that comes with being identical twins sharing the same tissue