Duke Health announced that surgeons at the institution successfully performed the first partial heart transplant in a neonatal patient with irreparable truncal valve dysfunction in the spring of 2022. Because the patient was so young, the surgeons could not perform a standard heart valve replacement procedure, since the new parts would not grow alongside the patient and the requirement of frequent replacement surgeries would lead to a 50% risk of mortality. The surgeons reported that 1 year after the partial heart transplant, the patient has sustained well-functioning valves and arteries and needed only 25% of the typical amount of immunosuppressants. The surgeons hope that their novel transplant strategy may streamline the domino heart transplant strategy—where one heart can be used to perform two life-saving procedures. They suggested that a clinical trial evaluating the efficacy of partial heart transplant should be conducted to achieve a higher volume of procedures and increase the utility of donor hearts. “If you introduce the donated hearts that weren’t being put to use into the supply chain and add the valves from domino heart transplants, that can create a substantial change,” concluded Joseph W. Turek, MD, PhD, Chief of Pediatric Cardiac Surgery at Duke Health.