Hannah Warren, the youngest person to ever receive a bioengineered organ has died, according to the New York Times.
The 2-year-old toddler was born without a trachea, and surgeons operated on her in April. She died on Saturday at Children's Hospital of Illinois in Peoria, where she had undergone the experimental surgery, the Times reports.
Hannah would have celebrated her third birthday in August.
"In the operation, Dr. Paolo Macchiarini, a specialist in the field of regenerative medicine who is affiliated with the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, implanted a bioengineered windpipe made from plastic fibers to which the girl's own cells, taken from her bone marrow, were added," the Times reports.
Hannah's operation was the sixth of its kind, and reportedly the first ever to be performed in the United States.
"Hannah was a pioneer...We knew going into this that she wasn't the best surgical candidate," Macchiarini told the Times.
The experimental transplant also involved surgery on Hannah's esophagus, which did not heal correctly, according to the Times. She reportedly died from complications stemming from her second operation.
"The trachea was never a problem," Macchiarini told the Times. "It was her native tissue that was very fragile."
Hannah's operation was approved by the Food and Drug Administration "under rules that allow experimental procedures when the patient otherwise has little hope of survival," the Times reports.
Macchiarini has performed the windpipe implants before Hannah's operation. An American man who was operated on in Stockholm also died, according to the Times.
"After the April surgery, officials at the Peoria hospital had talked about developing plans to become a center for regenerative medicine. Dr. Holterman said it was too early to talk about what the girl's death means for those plans," the Times reports.
Macchiarini says he will continue to operate and research to save lives in Hannah's memory.
