“This device can serve as a bridge to a real heart transplant,” said Dr. Alexis Shafii, surgical director at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center.
- Failure is the inability of the heart muscle to normally pump blood through the body.
- Each year in France, nearly 70,000 deaths are linked to heart failure and more than 150,000 hospitalizations are recorded following this pathology.
- A new type of artificial heart made of titanium could soon come to the aid of all these patients.
It could be an X-Men-esque scenario, but it’s not. For the first time in the world, a person with heart failure has been given a titanium heart.
Titanium Heart: “This is an extraordinary advance for heart failure”
The titanium heart of BiVACOR is a new type of product. Designed in Australia, it has been approved for testing on five humans in a study in the United States. The first of these patients was implanted on July 9 and lived with the device for 8 days, until it was replaced by a natural donor heart.
“This is an extraordinary breakthrough, as the BiVACOR can offer hope to countless patients suffering from end-stage heart failure. This device can serve as a bridge to a real heart transplant,” says Dr. Alexis Shafii, surgical director at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center.
“Future studies may one day be able to prove its potential as a pump that can also serve as a total replacement for a patient’s heart,” he believes.
Heart failure: how does the titanium heart work?
Like yours, the titanium heart has two ventricles. One sends blood to the lungs (pulmonary circulation) and the other to the rest of the body (systemic circulation). But unlike the natural version, this device doesn’t beat. It rotates.
In fact, the blood circulates in the titanium heart pushed by a rotating wheel that uses MAGLEV technology. This notably reduces the risk of mechanical wear and minimizes blood trauma.
The final advantage of the BiVACOR device is that titanium oxidizes easily, creating an inert film that covers the object and protects it from any biological reaction in the body.
Although this first patient only wore it for 8 days, the device has been implanted for longer periods in animals (notably for a month in a cohort of calves, editor’s note).
France: 70,000 deaths each year are linked to heart failure
Failure is the inability of the heart muscle to normally pump blood through the body. “It is a common, potentially severe disease, with a strong impact on quality of life if it is not detected in time and treated,” indicates Health Insurance.
Each year in France, nearly 70,000 deaths are linked to heart failure and more than 150,000 hospitalizations are recorded following this pathology.
