Man Gets Self-Contained Artificial Heart at UCLA
UCLA surgeons successfully implanted a self-contained artificial heart in a patient Wednesday, marking only the fourth time it has been done and the first time in the West.
Dr. Hillel Laks, who headed the surgical team, said Thursday that the 11-hour procedure “went exceptionally well and the artificial heart is functioning beautifully.”
The patient, a man in his 70s, was said to be resting comfortably. UCLA Medical Center did not release any other details about him.
Abiomed Inc. of Danvers, Mass., which makes the heart, has been criticized for withholding information about the earlier patients until well after their surgeries. The company has said it wanted to protect the privacy of the patients’ families and to avoid distracting the physicians from their work.
Surgeons at Jewish Hospital in Louisville, Ky., implanted the device--the AbioCor artificial heart--for the first time July 2 in Robert Tools, 59, who was near death from heart disease. They repeated the procedure Sept. 14 on Tom Christerson, 70, who was also near death.
A team from St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital in Houston performed the third procedure Sept. 28 on a man who so far has been described only as “desperately ill.”
All three patients are doing well, according to Edward E. Berger, a vice president of Abiomed.
The Food and Drug Administration has approved the use of the experimental device in five patients who are dying of heart failure and are too sick for a heart transplant. If the first five tests go well, as many as 15 of the hearts could be in use by next summer, Berger said.
The 2-pound titanium-and-plastic heart was implanted in the UCLA patient’s chest after his heart was removed. A battery and electronics were implanted elsewhere in his chest. The AbioCor device runs on the battery, which is recharged through the skin by a battery pack worn on a belt.
The artificial heart is reported to be working flawlessly in the first three patients, Berger said. Tools has left the hospital for short excursions, and surgeons are working toward his release.
The device could narrow at least part of the huge gap between the need for heart transplants and the supply of donor organs. It is estimated that as many as 100,000 Americans could benefit from a heart transplant each year--but only 2,400 hearts are available.
Other members of the surgical team were Dr. Daniel Marell and Dr. Jaime Moriguchi.
More information is available at www.artificialheart.ucla.edu.
