California doctor gets life-saving lung transplant after NBC News report

After NBC News reported on a new transplant technique for lung cancer, a California man with advanced cancer reached out to Northwestern Medicine and received a double lung and liver transplant.

As a pulmonologist, Dr. Gary Gibbon never expected to be diagnosed with lung disease himself, much less be in need of a new set of lungs.

“I had no previous medical history of any significance. I was on no medication at all on a regular basis,” Gibbon, of Santa Monica, California, told NBC News.

When he developed a cough and then lost weight, Gibbon got a chest X-ray and CT scan of his lungs. The results were shocking. In spring 2023, Gibbon, who recently turned 69, was told he had advanced stage lung cancer.

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths in the U.S. by a long shot, accounting for about 1 in 5 cancer deaths every year, according to the American Cancer Society.

After months of aggressive treatment with chemotherapy, radiation and immunotherapy Gibbon’s cancer shrunk, but his lungs were sustaining irreversible damage. His doctors determined that Gibbon had exhausted his treatment options.

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/cancer/california-doctor-lung-transplant-cancer-rcna145551

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