Japan's ninth set of organ transplant operations got under way Sunday afternoon on two women, one in her 40s and another in her 50s, from organs donated by a brain-dead woman, the Japan Organ Transplant Network said.
Earlier in the day, doctors, including Satoru Todo of Hokkaido University, removed two organs from the donor -- a kidney for the younger woman at the municipal hospital in Sapporo and a liver for the older woman at Kyoto University Hospital, network officials said.
According to the officials, Todo and the other doctors assessed the donor's organs immediately after she was legally pronounced brain-dead on Saturday evening before starting the search for possible recipients. She was in her 60s.