ST VINCENT’S surgeon Kumud Dhital was the first to make a dead heart beat again, transport it to hospital and successfully transplant it.

Now he’s experimenting with dousing the organ in funnel-web spider venom.

Surgeons used to rely solely on hearts from brain-dead donors that were still beating, then removed and transplanted within minutes.

Hearts don’t last on ice in an Esky the same way a liver can. Now surgeons can restart hearts that had stopped beating more than half an hour earlier and keep them pumping for up to six hours before transplant.

media_camera Surgeon Kumud Dhital is making dead heart beats again. Picture: Sam Ruttyn

Associate Professor Dhital has been nominated for the Pride of Australia medal, for his lifesaving work on heart transplants.

When someone’s heart stops the muscle cells don’t die instantly, it’s just no longer pumping blood, which is known as circulatory death.

MORE FROM JACK MORPHET

Dad’s long run Sydney to create son’s legacy

Honey running out as drought stings beekeepers

Farmer threatened if he takes hungry cattle to get more feed

“The novel part was transporting a circulatory death heart a distance and putting it into a recipient and the ­recipient doing well afterwards — that had never been done before,” he said. Surgeons at St Vincent’s have now performed 27 similar transplants.

There’s conjecture about why a heart couldn’t have been brought back to life in the donor if it can be revived after removal, which raises the question of whether the donor was really dead to begin with.

But NSW law is clear: Someone is dead two minutes after their heart stops beating.

media_camera He has been nominated for the Pride of Australia Medal for his lifesaving work on heart transplants. Picture: Sam Ruttyn

The surgeon only removes the heart a full two minutes after it’s stopped beating, then pumps it with special preserving solution.

Dr Dhital’s breakthrough has the potential to increase the number of hearts available for transplant in Australia by 50 per cent.

Associate Professor Dhital is tinkering with ways to extend the heart’s shelf life outside the body, including infusing the organ with funnel-web spider’s venom, which contains “a purified molecule” that stop cells dying.

Nominations for Pride of Australia are open and everyone is able to nominate.

For more information visit prideofaustralia.com.au