Personality Changes Associated with Organ Transplant Surgery

This is pretty cool. Its just one study, but still very interesting. People who have had organ transplants report personality changes. Sometimes the personality change matches to the personality of the person who gave up the organ for transplant, such as one person after transplant suddenly liking music, and that person had received the organ of a musician. Changes to emotions, sex drive, likes and dislikes for food ... all sorts of changes.

The personality may not all be in the brain. OR the personality seeps throughout the body somehow and leaves residual energy in the organs. OR it's all in the imagination of the person receiving the organ and their personality didn't really change because of the transplants.

Side note ... I've always said I didn't want to ever get an organ from someone else, even if it's to save my life. Now I"m thinking that's a very good decision. You never know what kind of person the organ would come from.


Personality Changes Associated with Organ Transplant Surgery

In a study published in Transplantology, researchers at the University of Colorado had 47 participants (23 heart recipients and 24 other organ recipients) complete an online survey detailing their experiences after transplant surgery. A staggering 89% of all transplant recipients reported post-op personality changes, regardless of the organ they received.

The CU study is among the first to track personality changes that occur after myriad types of organ transplants.

Previous research has tended to focus on the after-effects and anecdotes of heart transplant patients whose experiences edge toward the extreme and the enduring. Science Alert writes that following heart transplant surgery some patients report feeling more like their donor than themselves, developing new preferences for food, art, sex and behavior patterns.

One transplant recipient recalled developing a deep love for music after receiving the heart of a young musician in the 1990s. She told scientists, “I could never play before, but after my transplant, I began to love music. I felt it in my heart.”

But, the recent CU study indicates that our selfhood and preferences may very well be contained in every cell of the body, not just the heart.

Respondents to the CU survey reported four or more personality changes relative to temperament, emotions, food, identity, religious/spiritual beliefs and/or memories. The only change that differed between heart and other organ recipients was a change in physical attributes.

a reply to: FlyersFan

My little brother had a heart transplant in his 30s.

Still a bit of an ars@hole, but he's always been that way. LoL

One thing that we did notice was his hair which was greying came in completely jet black after his operation.

Doctors said it was down to medication(immunosuppressant).

So i suspect they could cure grey hair if they wanted to without dye.

More proof -- we are who we are born.

Not just organ transplant. People who receive fecal matter transplants report things from personality shifts, change in preferences, and even weight loss if the donor is super skinny.

The gut flora is considered a mini brain of its own. It has over 100 million nerve endings, more than many animal brains and more than the human spine.

I heard about this same thing decades ago from people who have had blood transfusions as well. It makes sense to me, I mean you have another person's DNA replicated in you. Doesn't seem natural to me.

a reply to: CriticalStinker

Apparently bacterial cells vs human cells in our bodies equate to a ratio of 1:1.

Meaning that for every human cell, there is approximately one bacterial cell.

The implication being that bacteria make up about half of the "cellular content" of our bodies even if it is a fraction of the body's total mass.

That's symbiosis in quite the scale if you think about it.

a reply to: andy06shake

That’s wild to think about. It really goes to show we’re walking ecosystems. Little worlds of our own.

a reply to: FlyersFan

Side note ... I've always said I didn't want to ever get an organ from someone else, even if it's to save my life. Now I"m thinking that's a very good decision. You never know what kind of person the organ would come from.

Be careful what you wish for. That dude that lit himself on fire in front of a Trumps trial last month donated his kidneys to someone. Hopefully, they won’t be more prone to self immolation.

Like all human studies, it is just so difficult to separate out a whole bunch of factors that have to do with the state of needing a transplant in the first place. You are going from a physically and emotionally bleak and deficient state with a poor future outlook, to one of a more properly functioning state with a lot more promise. That alone can account for so much personality change. I'm not saying there is no connection, but it is just too hard to decouple.

I read about a study on this phenomenon quite a few years ago, and talk show hosts featured transplant reciepients around that time. It really makes a perrson wonder!

I qualified for a double transplant in 2012, but didn't consider it for a second. There are so many yound people on the waiting list it didn't seem right for a senior citizen like me to be ahead of them. Besides, I'm extremely drug sensitive, and the anti-rejection meds would most likely caused problems that could have made life pretty miserable.

When the news reported David Rockefeller had just received his third heart transplant at the age of 99 I was pretty disgusted. His second heart transplant was only a couple of years before that, and here's a billionaire jumping to the top of the line to cheat someone else out of a heart that was likely much younger, with a lot to live for.
Transplant lists are long, and it's often years before a person reaches the top of the list.

If memory serves, Rockefellor only lived 3 months or so after his last transplant.

a reply to: Halfswede

I think we’re just too far away from understanding fully how us and even animals operate.

On a scientific level we say that most function of sentience should be in the brain. And then you have nature vs nurture debates where we ask if we’re more of a result of experiences vs genetic makeup.

But then you have little weird ones like organ transplant or the study of inherited memories. How do certain animals know what to be afraid of as babies if they’ve never encountered say a snake?

I think the cool thing about being alive in today’s time is that while we have a lot of scientific advancements, we still have a lot of wonder. I think it would be sad to live in a period where every answer was known.

originally posted by: CriticalStinker
a reply to: Halfswede

I think we’re just too far away from understanding fully how us and even animals operate.

On a scientific level we say that most function of sentience should be in the brain. And then you have nature vs nurture debates where we ask if we’re more of a result of experiences vs genetic makeup.

But then you have little weird ones like organ transplant or the study of inherited memories. How do certain animals know what to be afraid of as babies if they’ve never encountered say a snake?

I think the cool thing about being alive in today’s time is that while we have a lot of scientific advancements, we still have a lot of wonder. I think it would be sad to live in a period where every answer was known.

I think that the memories are encoded somehow in the DNA and passed on to the offspring, so certain behaviors toward certain species, or colors, or whatever was dangerous, becomes instinctive by nature.

originally posted by: Annee

More proof -- we are who we are born.

Wow,no # Sherlock.
Talk about stating the obvious but how does that work out with the sexual organ mutilation you support and encourage?

I read about this years ago, soo it most be true with all the years of research on transplant recipients.

Is amazing, I guess it has to do with mixing DNA from one individual to other individual, I mean the individual DNA molecules, each human being is exclusive to other human being after all.

I guess taking a donor organ may bring the traits of the original owner in some capacity.

I believe it.

originally posted by: marg6043
I read about this years ago, soo it most be true with all the years of research on transplant recipients.

Is amazing, I guess it has to do with mixing DNA from one individual to other individual, I mean the individual DNA molecules, each human being is exclusive to other human being after all.

I guess taking a donor organ may bring the traits of the original owner in some capacity.

I believe it.

They say that married people become more and more like each other as time passes. And I'm sure that just as to do with their being together all the time. But perhaps it also has to do with the intimate relationship they have with each other, and the special union they have the mixing of their DNA. I often wonder if that is part of what Jesus meant when he said the "two would become one flesh." I could be wrong but it's something I've wondered about:

And the two do indeed become one flesh in the form of their offspring where the DNA is combined to form a new life!

"‘For this reason a man will leave his father and his mother and will stick to his wife, and the two will be one flesh’?"-Matthew 19:5

They also become one flesh of course in the fact that they should be in harmony and supporting each other as a marriage unit.

a reply to: randomuser2034

I agree, it has do to with how we as humans and being one race, but interestingly we are individuals, and two individuals are not equal no even twins.

I have always wonder too about becoming one flesh, I guess it has to do with mixing DNA and having offsprings.

Interesting, thanks for the post.

And yes some couples that has been together for many years do resemble each other, no only physical but the way the behave and interact.

a reply to: CriticalStinker

Yeah. There are a lot of interesting things that are inherent in animals beyond DNA. In the future, scientists will begin to understand that DNA is more of a symptom of those unerlying things than the cause. They are already seeing that snapshots over someones life differ.

What makes a border collie just feel like herding whether it is raised with cats, people, or any environment. It's almost like it is programmed in through some kind of ...intelligent system. From my perspective, everything has an underlying spiritual element in the microcosm whether it be rock, tree, or still-living organ where each cell is living its own individual purpose, defending from invasion, reproducing, etc., but more or less unaware it is tied to the bigger whole.

I think these things will be much more clear in the future, but the focus has to shift from technology back to life and so on.

Cheers all, in case this place shuts down.

Falun Dafa Hao!

a reply to: CriticalStinker

Not just organ transplant. People who receive fecal matter transplants report things from personality shifts, change in preferences, and even weight loss if the donor is super skinny.

Fecal matter transplants?

Why in God's name would anyone want that?

It gives me the shivers just thinking about it...

originally posted by: SchrodingersRat
a reply to: CriticalStinker

Not just organ transplant. People who receive fecal matter transplants report things from personality shifts, change in preferences, and even weight loss if the donor is super skinny.

Fecal matter transplants?

Why in God's name would anyone want that?

It gives me the shivers just thinking about it...

You need the bacteria.