Amazing research doesn't negate need to stay heart-healthy

Take a heart, and pour detergent in it until all but the outer shell has been eaten away. Inject some new heart cells, let them grow, then zap the organ to make it beat.

It sounds far-fetched, but that's what researchers at the University of Minnesota have been doing with rat hearts first, and are now trying with pig hearts.

Writing in the journal Nature Medicine, the researchers explained how the process, using a regular soap solution, dissolved existing cells, leaving a "white, almost gelatin-looking heart." Heart cells from baby rats were then pumped through that "scaffold," which accepted them and allowed them to grow. After they began "quivering" like normal heart cells in cardiac arrest, a pacemaker was applied to teach the cells to pump together in a regular rhythm.

Later, the heart continued to beat, even after the pacemaker was removed.

Amazing stuff, and something that could save many lives. But don't count on it working for humans soon, if ever.

Until -- and if -- it works, we're stuck with the old tried-and-true: don't smoke, control your diabetes and blood pressure, reduce cholesterol and get plenty of exercise.

Yes, heart transplants are an option of last resort, but they're still basically a desperation measure. In 2006, only 2,192 heart transplants were performed, according to the American Heart Association, but 4,000 to 5,000 people who needed one didn't get one because none were available.

State Sen. Joel Johnson of Kearney wants to do something about that last situation.

A retired surgeon, Johnson's LB246 would require county coroners to quickly examine the deceased to determine a cause of death, so that more organs could be salvaged.

Now, coroners sometimes wait until several hours after a death to examine bodies, and the wait can render organs useless for transplanting.

In Nebraska, county attorneys are also designated as coroners, but the job of examining bodies often is hired out to medical personnel trained to do so.

Quick harvesting of organs is important everywhere, but especially in Nebraska, where geography may separate donors and recipients by many miles.

LB246 seems like a step in the right direction.