After Multiple Organ Transplants, Grateful for 25 Extra Years

This Thanksgiving marks a little more than 25 years since Christine Galan became the first person in the Western U.S. to have a combined organ transplant (heart and liver), and nearly five years since she returned to Cedars-Sinai for another organ transplant—this time, a kidney.

In that time, she’s earned a finisher’s medal from the New York City Marathon, which she ran to raise funds and awareness for organ donation; kept busy with a full-time job and volunteer work; moved to a new state; and continued to thrive.

“I’m very lucky—I’m doing amazingly well,” Galan said. “No issues, no problems—just living life to the fullest. I am so grateful.”

She credits her Cedars-Sinai care team for her good outcome.

“They took such good care of me,” she said. “I wouldn’t have gone anywhere else.”

In October 1998, at 36 years old, Galan was ready to give up on life. She had battled lupus since her teen years, and complications from the autoimmune disease had left her with congestive heart failure, multiple liver stones and narrowing of her liver. Barely able to move, she was living with her parents and had been in the intensive care unit for nearly three months before the family got the news they had been waiting on for years: A heart and liver were available for Galan.

Less than two weeks after her combined transplant surgery, Galan was home from the hospital—and for the next 20 years, she thrived.

But by 2017, Galan was in kidney failure—which can occur as a side effect of longterm immunosuppression. She had been on dialysis for nearly two years when she learned she had been matched with a living donor for a new kidney.

“The new kidney went in, I was working from my hospital room the very next day, and I’ve never looked back,” Galan said. “My attitude has always been, just let me live.”

Every year, she sends the kidney donor, whom she has met in person, a thank-you note.

“She saved my life,” Galan said. “Because of her, I’m still here.”

Today, there are more than 100,000 people in the U.S. on the organ transplant waiting list, according to the United Network for Organ Sharing, the nonprofit organization that manages the U.S. organ transplant system. About 23,000 of those waiting are in California.

This past year was the busiest yet for the Cedars-Sinai Comprehensive Transplant Center and the Smidt Heart Institute. In 2023, Cedars-Sinai has completed more than 600 transplants—the most ever in its history.

The medical center also is among the top centers in the U.S. for multi-organ transplants. In July, the transplant team performed the hospital’s first successful triple transplantation during a 20-hour surgery.

It’s also known for state-of-the-art care and advanced therapies when it comes to complex transplantation cases.

“Cedars-Sinai is an extremely specialized medical center where other hospitals send their most complex patients with end-organ disease,” said Irene Kim, MD, director of the Cedars-Sinai Comprehensive Transplant Center, the Esther and Mark Schulman Chair in Surgery and Transplantation Medicine, and the surgeon who performed Galan’s kidney transplant. “Through the generous gift of life from organ donors, our transplant programs offer patients hope for an opportunity at recovery.”

Galan is outspoken about the need for more organ donors. And to patients on the organ waitlist, her message is that there is no better medicine than optimism.

“People should know there is success in organ transplant and that we are living longer,” Galan said. “Look at how long I’ve lasted, thanks to my Cedars-Sinai team and the generosity of donors. If I can encourage even one person to check that little organ donor box on their driver’s license, I will know I’ve done a good thing with my life.”

During the holiday season of giving and receiving, Galan is especially reflective.

“Donating an organ is the greatest gift you can give.”

Read more on the Cedars-Sinai Blog: Being Patient: The Delicate Timing of Organ Transplantation