Left Ventricular Assist Device
The Left Ventricular Assist Device (LVAD) is used as a bridge to transplant, bridge to recovery and as destination therapy (long-term treatment for patients who are ineligible for a heart transplant).
Helping the Heart
Heart pumps, or ventricular assist devices, are being used to treat patients with severe heart failure. The devices are temporary for some and permanent for others. they are attached to a patient's own heart and run by batteries.
The pump is placed just below the diaphragm in the abdomen. It collects blood from the left ventricle and pumps it through the aorta.
Natural circulation continues as the implant provides additional support, pumping blood throughout the body.
HeartMate
The HeartMate is a fist-sized implantable LVAD which keeps heart transplant candidates alive who have run out of options while waiting for a donor organ.
The Thoratec HeartMate is FDA approved. Using titanium parts, it is smaller than other commercially available implantable VAD devices and one of the most recent generation of LVADs performing the work of the main pumping chamber of the heart.
LVADs offer a short-term bridge to transplant. However, the HeartMate can be used indefinitely, as the device does not destroy blood cells and the inner surface of the device become lined with the patient's own endothelial cells as blood flows through it.
The HeartMate is a portable device allowing the patient an improved quality of life and psycholocigal outlook. The LVAD is attached to a battery-containing console, but patients are able to move about freely and exercise.