Yang Feng, the first Chinese alive who received a small intestine transplant works beside a photo of him taken before the operation at a hospital in Xi'an, northwest China's Shaanxi Province January 27. Yang has lived eight years since the transplant, setting a record in Asia, and got married on Saturday. [Xinhua]

XI'AN -- A small intestine transplant patient, a 27-year-old man from the central Henan Province, married on Saturday nearly eight years after an organ transplant from his father saved his life.

Yang Feng was diagnosed with diverticulosis, a serious intestinal disease, as a baby and had to rely on large doses of antibiotics throughout his childhood to ease inflammations.

When he was 18, surgeons had to remove almost 500 cm, or 90 percent, of his small intestine, causing serious digestion and excretion problems that were threatening his life.

Yang was 183 cm tall and weighed only 35 kg. Seeing the life of his son is at risk, the father accompanied him to the Xijing Hospital in Xi'an, Shaanxi Province.

Doctors told them that a small intestine transplant was their last hope. They also said that at that time, the experience of Chinese doctors in small intestine transplant was limited to transplant from dead bodies. Results of such operations were not very "ideal".

Transplant of small intestine from a live body, especially from a relative, will produce a much better result in theory. However, such transplant has never been done in China before.

Yang's father Yang Runsheng, a peasant farmer, then made a decision to donate part of his own intestine to save the young man's life.

The operation in May 1999 involved more than 60 medical staff at the Xijing Hospital in Xi'an. About 150 cm of the father's ileum, part of the small intestine, was transplanted into the son.

Eight years after the operation, father and son are healthy, except that the young man still takes anti-immunity drugs daily to minimize the risk of rejection, said Wang Weizhong, a surgeon with the Xijing Hospital. "But it's a small dose and has little side effect. I don't think there'll be any problem if the couple want a baby."

Yang's bride Li Yali was his classmate at primary school and witnessed his ordeal over the years. "I always believed he would recover and live a normal life," she said.

Sources at the Xijing Hospital in Xi'an said Yang was by far the longest surviving small intestine transplant patient in Asia. The hospital has also given Yang a temporary job as a cleaner.

Prof. Fan Daiming, an academician with the Chinese Academy of Engineering, said Yang had created a miracle because a small intestine transplant is more difficult than any other organ transplant and very few people survived the operation and the subsequent rejections.

An adult's small intestine is between five and seven meters long and it is difficult to survive with less than one meter.

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