Toddler going home after six-organ transplant

A Japanese toddler is going home nine months after undergoing a six-organ transplant that could not be done in his country because donated organs are not available for young children.

Nineteen-month-old Yosuke Ohashi received a new liver, pancreas, stomach, small and large intestines and spleen in an 8 1/2-hour operation Christmas Eve at the University of Miami Jackson Memorial Medical Center.

Yosuke was squirming and laughing Friday in an office at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, surrounded by his parents, Yukiho and Yoshie Ohashi, and Tomoaki Kato, the surgeon who led the team that performed the transplants. The family departs today for Japan.

“Happy,” Yoshie Ohashi said of herself and her son, who had a condition that limited his intestinal function and caused his liver to deteriorate.

Of Kato, Yukiho Ohashi said: “He made a miracle.”

Japanese law does not allow children younger than 15 to be organ donors, a measure enacted to protect the rights of children.