Heart pump to help with heart failure in development

With funding from the British Heart Foundation, researchers at Leicester University are developing an artificial heart pump to help people with heart failure. Left ventricular assist devices (LVAD) are a short term solution to support patients with heart failure being considered for a transplant but unlikely survive the wait for a donor heart. The new LVAD can be inserted into the chest wall via laparoscopic surgery, and does not sit inside the heart, thus minimising the risk of blood clotting and infection.
Associate Professor and Interventional Cardiologist in the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, Dr David Adlam, said: “Someone who’s had a severe heart attack, for example, can deteriorate rapidly with heart pump failure and often isn’t well enough to be transferred for open-heart surgery under a general anaesthetic. What we need is a device that can be implanted through the skin using techniques commonly used in most heart attack centres so it is available when and where it’s needed. For patients who only need temporary support, it can also be easily taken out when the heart has had time to recover. The work we’re doing is happening in parallel with simultaneous advances, such as those in battery technology. We’re seeing the development of smaller, lighter batteries that can potentially be re-charged across the skin. Even with current treatments, there are also many heart failure patients who still have symptoms that substantially reduce their quality of life. There’s a real unmet need for new technologies to help these patients.”