Heart Transplant services

Heart Transplant

Providing transplantation services for the heart requires a delicate mix of expertise, skill, and technology. The use of DBD and DCD hearts, NRP and OCS machines, the careful selection of surgeons and their use of best practices, and the vigilance and care of medical professionals throughout the transplantation process is paramount for the success of heart transplantation. We must continue to sustain this delicate balance to save lives, alleviate human pain and ultimately make our world a better place.

Donor Net primary survey calls

Serving as a primary survey for Donor Net's call for hearts is an important responsibility. By providing accurate and detailed information about potential organ donors, we play a critical role in the process of matching donors with those in need. Our attention to detail and commitment to thoroughness can make all the difference in ensuring successful outcomes.

We can take calls 24/7 to cover this step of transplantation

We have a nationwide net of heart failure cardiologists who can perform the primary survey.

Competitive call rate

Heart recovery from donors after brain death: DBD.

Careful coordination and communication among healthcare professionals are essential for successful heart procurement and transplantation. We stay current with all new devices for preservation and transportation. We have the expertise for instrumenting and connecting the heart to any device on the market.

We provide the surgeon

We provide an assistant

We provide a preservationist

We can provide the full team as a package

We make sure to follow each institution’s preferences in the recovery process

Heart recovery from donors after Circulatory death: DCD

Donation after DCD has increased the pool of organs such as heart and lungs. It can increase the number of heart transplants by 15-30% and reduce the death rate in the hospital's waiting list by 40%. There are two methods to recover the heart:

Outside the chest resuscitation: in the this method, the chest is opened swiftly, the right atrium (RA) is cannulated with a large two-stage venous cannula, and 1100cc to 1500cc of blood is collected in collection bags in less than 1 to 1.5 minutes followed by aortic cross-clamping and delivery of cold cardioplegia into the aortic root. After the cross clamp and delivery of cardioplegia, the heart is recovered. We then connect the recovered heart to the organ care system (OCS) after the procurement to allow coronary perfusion. This allows the heart to recover from the warm ischemic injury and allows the real-time assessment of heart function. Finally the heart is delivered to the transplant center on the machine, optimizing long distance transport.

Intra-thoracic resuscitation: the aorta and right atrium are cannulated, and modified veno-arterial extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (VA-ECMO) is instituted, called normothermic regional perfusion, or NRP. NRP is of two types depending upon the organs planned to be recovered. In donors where the heart, as well as other abdominal organs, are planned to be recovered, thoracoabdominal normothermic regional perfusion (TA-NRP) is performed, while in donors with only abdominal organ recovery, abdominal-NRP (A-NRP) is performed . The different cannulation and circuit methods are illustrated in the figure below. After establishing the circulation we perform assessment of the heart after 30 and 45 minutes. If the heart is a go, then we perform a normal recovery and we deliver the heart using cold ischemia or normothermic on OCS .

We have an efficient team to perform DCD hearts

We are trained to use organ care system (OCS)

We have a dedicated team for NRP, and can travel on demand

We have our own circuit and perfusionist for NRP

We can help local surgeons to perform DCD hearts

We can help the abdominal team to establish abdominal NRP

Heart And Lung Transplant National Recovery Program

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Heart Transplant services