PUNE: Sahyadri Super Speciality Hospital, Deccan, recently conducted a rare and high risk Left Ventricular Assist Device implantation (LVAD) procedure on a 22-year-old Yemeni national suffering from end-stage heart failure.
A team of doctors under the leadership of well-known heart transplant surgeon Dr Manoj Durairaj, Programme Director, Department of Heart transplantation Sahyadri Hospitals including Dr Shantanu Shastri, Dr Suhas Sonawane, Dr Saurabh Bokil, Dr Priti Adate, Dr Deepak Bhavsar, Prashant Dhumal, Amar Jadhav, Samrat Bagal, Dr Swati Nikam, Transplant Coordinator performed this high-risk procedure successfully. The patient is now doing fine and will go home within a couple of weeks.
Explaining the case Dr Manoj Durairaj, Programme Director, Department of Heart Transplantation Sahyadri Hospitals, said that when this patient approached them four months back, he was suffering from breathlessness.
“Investigations revealed that the main pumping chamber of his heart was affected, which resulted in end-stage heart failure. We decided to go for Left Ventricular Assist Device implantation (LVAD) implantation procedure as the patient was very sick. In such cases, a heart transplant may be an option, but being an overseas patient, the long waiting period could have virtually shut any hopes,” said Durairaj.
“The procedure involves performing open-heart surgery on a heart-lung machine. The surgery is challenging because the patients have advanced heart failure, so managing the patient during and after surgery requires high levels of training of doctors and other health care providers. The implanted machine is controlled from outside initially so that the programming has to be perfect before discharge,” said Dr Durairaj.
The machine, which is implanted runs on a miniature mobile battery control unit, which has to be carried by the patient and required recharging every 8 to 12 hours. The patient and the caregivers are given training on managing this unit and taking care of the batteries.
The patient will also have to be on blood thinner tablets.
Dr Jayashree Apte, Executive Director Sahyadri Hospitals, congratulated the team of doctors and said that availability of expert doctors, trained staff and state of art infrastructure ensures we can fulfil all the patient requirements of tertiary care especially in complicated and high-risk procedures as in this case.
ABOUT LVAD PROCEDURE
- The LVAD takes over the function of the main pumping chamber of the heart, the left ventricle.
- This option is chosen for patients with end-stage heart failure when all other treatment options have failed.
- The survival of such patients without any treatment is only 5 per cent over 1 year.
- It can be a permanent treatment or can be used as a bridge to a heart transplant.
- With LVAD these patients have a huge survival benefit of over 90 per cent in the first year and good long term outcomes.
- It takes approximately a week in ICU and 2 weeks in the hospital to adjust the rates and flow of blood being pumped by the machine into the body.
