TRANSPLANT teams in the region are coming up against a new problem in their bid to increase the number of heart operations.

More younger potential donors are being rejected because their hearts are already damaged by disease.

Surgeons at the Freeman Hospital, in Newcastle, are finding signs of coronary heart disease in potential donors in their 30s.

The would-be donors often appear to be in good physical health.

But when investigations are carried out prior to transplant, some hearts from younger patients have to be rejected.

Lyn Holt, a long-serving cardiac transplant co-ordinator at the Freeman, said: "We are seeing younger donors who already have heart disease.

"These are people in their 30s and upwards who are otherwise fit and healthy. The fact that they have coronary heart disease makes their hearts unsuitable for transplantation."

This new complication is increasing pressure on the region's only transplant centre which, like every other UK unit, cannot meet the local demand for transplants.

Last year, the Freeman carried out about 79 heart, heart-and-lung and lung transplants, including 11 children.

So far this financial year, the Freeman has carried out about 23, roughly the same as the equivalent period last year.

But the transplant team said that for every operation carried out, many more patients are waiting for surgery.

Within the area covered by the Freeman, which includes the North-East and parts of North Yorkshire, there are 28 patients waiting for either a heart or heart-and-lung transplant.

Eighty patients are waiting for either a single or double lung transplant.

The picture is similar for kidney and liver transplants. By this stage last year, the Freeman had carried out 52 kidney transplants.

So far this year, 56 kidney transplants have been performed.

Another ten liver transplants have been carried out so far, a similar total to the same period last year.

About 230 people are waiting for a kidney transplant, while 15 are waiting for a new liver.

This week, the Government urged more people to carry donor cards as it launched a ten-year plan for transplant services.

While more than 2,700 heart, lung, kidney and liver transplants had been carried out by the end of 2002/3, 6,025 people were still waiting for an organ donation, 401 of them dying before a transplant.