Washington - A US man who held the world record for living the longest after a single heart transplant has died of cancer at the age of 51, according to a report on Tuesday. Tony Huesman of Washington Township, Ohio, died Sunday from melanoma, a form of skin cancer, his wife, Carol, told the Dayton Daily News.
Huesman was approaching the 31st anniversary of living with a transplanted heart and had already had the longest life of any such patient in medical history.
"Tony was disappointed that he had lived so long with the transplanted heart only to find out that it was cancer which seemed to be taking his life," Carol Huesman said, according to the newspaper.
Huesman received his heart transplant on August 30, 1978, at Stanford University Medical Center in California. The organ came from an anonymous donor. Huesman had previously said he'd been told that the donor was motorcyclist who died in an accident.
He went on to found Huesman Heart Foundation in Dayton, Ohio to educate the public about maintaining a healthy heart.
