SEATTLE - On Thursday a West Richland man who received a new heart and lungs walked on his own for the first time in more than a decade.

Thirty-year-old Patrick Farris received a heart and lung transplant just days ago at the University of Washington Medical Center.

It's the first time doctors there have performed the procedure.

Farris, once healthy and vibrant, has spent the last decade of his life with an advanced form of cystic fibrosis and cardiomyopathy, a chronic heart condition.

Doctors put him at the top of the transplant list after realizing he was months away from death.

"Fortunately that did happen quite quickly because he was very ill," said Dr. Michael Mulligan.

After five and a half hours on the operating table, the procedure was a success.

"Whenever we go out, it's loading his wheelchair in the vehicle and making sure we have his oxygen tanks on us, and he's excited he won't have to do that anymore," said Maria Wray, Farris' sister.

The University of Washington hopes this is just the beginning of many more surgeries to come.

The key, however, is to get more people to become donors.

Farris' sister's life was saved after receiving a heart transplant 11 years ago.