when was the first heart transplant

The first successful human heart transplant was performed on 3 December 1967 by South African surgeon Christiaan Barnard at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa, on patient Louis Washkansky.

Key details

• Date: 3 December 1967.

• Surgeon: Christiaan Barnard, leading a team of about 30 staff members.

• Location: Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town, South Africa.

• Recipient: Louis Washkansky, a 54‑year‑old grocer with severe, incurable heart disease.

• Outcome: Washkansky survived 18 days after the operation, ultimately dying of pneumonia rather than rejection of the transplanted heart.

Why it matters

• This operation is widely regarded as the first human‑to‑human heart transplant and a turning point in modern cardiac surgery.

• Despite the short survival time, it proved that whole‑heart transplantation was technically feasible and led to rapid development of transplant programs worldwide in the late 1960s and beyond.

Related milestones

• First adult heart transplant in the United States: performed by Norman Shumway at Stanford University Hospital on 6 January 1968.

• First heart transplant in the United Kingdom: performed by Donald Ross on 3 May 1968.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.