Novel ‘heart in a box’ technology gives London, Ont., patient ‘second life’

Raj Mittal at his home in London, Ont., Sept. 23. Nicole Osborne/The Globe and Mail

Raj Mittal’s new heart came in an unusual package.

After a cardiac arrest and a triple bypass in June, 2025, he spent a month and a half sedated in intensive care at the London Health Sciences Centre in Ontario before he could return home to his wife and two children.

When his heart condition led to pneumonia in January and another hospital stay, he learned he was a candidate for a heart transplant.

Typically heart donors are patients who have been declared brain dead, but whose hearts are still beating. Once the organs are removed they are placed on ice, and can last in this state for only up to six hours, limiting how far they can travel.