The transplant process is an incredible paradox, said Dr. Kenton J. Zehr, chief of the division of cardiothoracic surgery at Scott & White. There's sadness on one end and joy at the other.

"There are very few things in medicine quite like that and everybody understands that and respects it greatly," he said. "That's part of the reverence that goes with transplantation. There's something mystical about transplanting a heart because it beats in somebody and then it beats in another."