Before the procedure is done, your doctor will determine whether you are a good candidate by performing the following tests:

• Blood typing
• Tissue typing, to help make sure your body will not reject the donated lung
• Blood tests or skin tests to check for infections
• Tests to evaluate your lungs
• Tests to evaluate your heart, such as EKG, echocardiogram, or cardiac catheterization
• Tests to look for early cancer

If your transplant team believes that you are a good candidate for lung transplantation, you will be put on a national waiting list. Your place on the waiting list is based on a number of factors. Key factors include:

• What type of lung problems you have
• The severity of your lung disease
• The likelihood that a transplant will be successful

The amount of time you spend on a waiting list usually does not determine how soon you get a lung, except possibly with children. Waiting time is often at least 2 - 3 years.

While you are waiting for a new lung, follow these guidelines:

• Follow any diet your lung transplant team recommends. Stop drinking alcohol, do not smoke, and keep your weight in the recommended range.
• Take all medicines as they were prescribed. Report changes in your medications and any new or worsening medical problems to the transplant team.
• Follow any exercise program that you were taught during pulmonary rehabilitation.
• Keep any appointments that you have made with your regular doctor and transplant team.
• Let the transplant team know how to contact you immediately if a lung becomes available. Make sure that, no matter where you go, you can be contacted quickly and easily.
• Be prepared in advance to go to the hospital.

Before the procedure, always tell your doctor or nurse:

• What drugs, vitamins, herbs, and other supplements you are taking, even ones you bought without a prescription.
• If you have been drinking a lot of alcohol (more than one or two drinks a day)

Do not eat or drink anything after midnight the night before your surgery. Take only the drugs that your doctor told you to take with a small sip of water.