Boyd Rush

Rush was born on Independence Day, 1895, in Coldwater, Mississippi. He was white and had a sixth-grade education. During the U.S. draft for World War I, he was living in Enid, Mississippi and working as a day laborer. His physical build was listed as "stout."

In 1936, he married Mary Senora "Nora" Bridges. In 1942, he and his wife were living in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where he was working at Jack's Cookie Company. He has also been described as a "deaf mute."

James D. Hardy at the University of Mississippi Medical Center, who had previously performed the world's first lung transplant with a dead human donor, had also been impressed by the limited success of Keith Reemtsma in transplanting chimpanzee kidneys into human patients. Hardy acquired four chimpanzees for the possibility of a heart transplant.

Dean of the Medical School Robert Marston and Hardy jointly established conditions for a heart transplant which included, that since a heart transplant was highly experimental, they could only consider a patient already close to death and who had no other hope of survival.

On July 22, 1964, Rush had been found unconscious by neighbors. His lower left leg was black with gangrene, his face was mottled with blood clots, and he only had a faint pulse. All these symptoms were likely caused by his heart's inability to pump enough blood.

Since Rush had been brought to the hospital in a coma, Mrs. J.H. Thompson who was either his sister or stepsister (sources vary) was asked to sign the consent form which made no mention that an animal heart might be used. A 2012 article in the Baylor University Medical Center Proceedings stated, "Such was the medicolegal situation at that time that this 'informed' consent was not considered in any way inadequate." Hardy later stated that he had verbally discussed the procedure in detail with relatives including the possibility of using a chimpanzee heart, although there was only the one relative.

There was also a trauma victim in the hospital's ICU who was brain-dead and whose family had given permission for him to be a heart donor. However, the legal definition of death at the time required that the heartbeat stop, and this trauma victim's heart still beat. The concept of brain death had not yet received widespread acceptance. On Jan. 22, Hardy amputated the gangrenous portions of Rush's left leg. On Jan. 23 at approximately 11:00 pm, Rush went into shock and his blood pressure fell to 60. Hardy took him into the operating room. Rush's heart stopped just before they attached him to the heart-lung machine. Hardy then polled the other four doctors regarding whether should continue with the transplant knowing that they would now use a chimpanzee heart and would likely receive much public criticism. The first doctor said yes, the next abstained, and the last two also said yes. They began the heart transplant using the largest of the four chimpanzees. Just after 2:00 am in the early morning hours of Friday, Jan. 24, 1964, Hardy completed the stitching to connect the chimpanzee heart into Rush's chest. He used a defibrillator to start the donor heart beating. It did beat for 60 minutes (some sources say 90 minutes) and then could not be restarted.

After the transplant attempt, the hospital's director of public information put out a guarded statement which included the phrase "the dimensions of the only available donor heart." The Associated Press assumed the donor heart was that of a human being and widely distributed the story. The hospital was thereby put in the position of issuing a correction, which embarrassed both the hospital and Hardy. Hardy was further embarrassed at a medical convention two weeks later. Hardy withdrew from the transplant race. He later wrote, "I had noted that when one loses his academic post, for whatever reason, he is not likely to get another one of comparable significance. I decided to wait until Shumway and his group transplanted a heart in man."

Rush at the time was either living in Hattiesburg or in the Laurel Trailer Park on the outskirts of Jackson, Mississippi.

The operation started at approximately 11:00 pm on January 23, but the chimp heart was inserted in Boyd's body at approximately 2:00 am. on Jan. 24, 1964.

Close to four years later, Christiaan Barnard at Groote Schuur hospital in South Africa performed the world's first human-to-human heart transplant on Dec. 3, 1967. The patient Louis Washkansky did regain consciousness, and in fact, lived for 18 days before dying of pneumonia. The donor heart was from 25 year-old Denise Darvall who had been rendered brain dead after she and her mother had been struck by a drunk driver. Her father gave permission for the transplant.