Interviews

1. Difference between experiences of youth and older people in WWII camps

2. His experiences in Chicago after WWII

3. Finding a way to keep donor kidneys longer in order to ship to matched patients

4. Creating a registry to study the outcome of transplants

5. Using tissue typing and blood tests to determine paternity

6. Developing the tray used in determining HLA types for tissue typing

7. The HLA and transplantation history books

8. Developing the micro test was the most important accomplishment

9. Continuing to work to improve transplanting success

(b.1929) Pioneer medical researcher in tissue transfer and organ transplantation.

Continuing to work to improve transplanting success

The measurement of rejection in transplant patients with antibodies. I suppose that’s what keeps me going. I mean, I still want to establish that and show that it really is important. And also, to see that it will take the next step in advancing results of transplants because we’ve been sort of stuck a little bit. And [after] 10 years, half of the transplants are lost—this is kidneys, hearts, livers. So that’s a project that we’re working on. See, the one-year survival is 90 percent, but the 10-year survival is 50 percent. That’s a problem. So we talk about transplants as though it’s a successful procedure, but it’s not really. I mean from the patient’s point of view, not really successful. You don’t want to get transplanted if you can avoid it. But, we hope that now, it will be possible to change that. And that’s what we’re working on.

medicine

Date: February 10, 2004

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Gwenn M. Jensen

Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum.

Interviewee Bio

Paul Terasaki, born in 1929, is a UCLA Medical Professor Emeritus and a pioneer in tissue transfer research who continues to speak globally on tissue typing and organ transplantation. In 1991 he edited a volume entitled History of Transplantation: Thirty-five Recollections.

He and his wife Hisako, a renowned painter, take a strong interest in U.S.-Japan relations and the affairs of the Japanese American community. Together they established an endowment at the UCLA Asian American Studies Center to fund fellowships for UCLA graduate students from Japan pursuing research on the historical and contemporary experiences and issues of the Japanese American population. Additionally, a Paul I. Terasaki Endowed Chair in U.S.-Japan Relations supports a distinguished teaching program designed to bring experts in the field of Japanese studies and U.S.-Japan relations to UCLA. (February 10, 2004)