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Jarvik 2000 Heart Assist System Helps Patients Prepare for Transplant

Jefferson Advanced Heart Failure and Cardiac Transplant Center: First and only in Pennsylvania to implant this new device

Heart assist devices have traditionally been used to stabilize patients awaiting transplants. Scott Silvestry, MD, cardiac surgeon at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital and Assistant Professor of Surgery at Jefferson Medical College, says use of these devices is likely to increase in the years to come.

“There are about 3,000 people on the heart transplant list,” Dr. Silvestry explains. “Of those, 400 to 500 have assist devices of some variety, and that number is going to continue to grow.”

Dr. Silvestry says that a large part of what’s driving that growth is the evolution of the devices themselves.

“In the past, there was a tremendous hesitation to implant heart assist devices because they were large and bulky,” he says. “Also, the older devices required open-heart bypass surgery with an abdominal component. Perhaps only 30 percent of those eligible for an assist device would actually have one implanted.”

Next generation of devices
The next generation of devices – and the Jarvik 2000 Heart Assist System, in particular – may change that trend.

The Jarvik is the smallest and simplest left ventricular assist device available today. About the size of a C battery, this device fits directly inside the heart’s left chamber. Once in the patient’s chest, the Jarvik 2000 pumps blood from the heart at up to seven liters per minute – augmenting a weakened heart’s blood output to help restore a normal flow throughout the body.

Scott C Silvestry, MD

Linda Bogar, MD

Paul J Mather, MD

In March of this year, Dr. Silvestry and Linda Bogar, MD, implanted the Jarvik 2000 Heart Assist System in the chest of a 55-year-old man suffering from chronic heart failure.

Performed as part of an FDA-authorized clinical trial, that surgery marked the first implantation of the Jarvik device in the state of Pennsylvania. Since then, the Jefferson Advanced Heart Failure and Cardiac Transplant Center has implanted the Jarvik on a second patient – and the team remains the only one in the state to have used this revolutionary device.

Unlike the older generation of heart assist devices, the Jarvik can be implanted through a less invasive surgery. Dr. Silvestry explains that he and his team implanted the Jarvik 2000 through an incision in the left chest, and without the use of the heart-lung machine.

This less-invasive surgery is helpful for the bridge to transplant, or BTT, indication, Dr. Silvestry notes: “For patients where a transplant is clearly the best course of action, it’s always better for the patient to be living as normal a life as possible prior to surgery.”

Indeed, as Paul Mather, MD, Director of the Advanced Heart Failure and Cardiac Transplant Center at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital and Associate Professor of Medicine at Jefferson Medical College explains, “The Jarvik 2000 Heart Assist System is designed to complement the heart’s own function, not to entirely replace it. Patients who are implanted with a Jarvik should be able to resume somewhat normal lives while wearing the device.”

Dr. Silvestry says that for some patients, long-term use of a heart assist device, such as the Jarvik 2000, could potentially produce a better outcome than an actual transplant.

“There’s no question that a very young patient does better with a heart transplant,” he says. “But no one really knows whether a much older patient does. There will be studies in the next five to 10 years that will explore the use of heart assist devices as an extended therapy to prolong, or avoid, the need for a transplant in some patients.”

In the meantime, heart failure patients who want the support of a team with the broadest array of tools should turn to Jefferson’s Advanced Heart Failure and Cardiac Transplant Center.

“The Jarvik 2000 is our latest tool for advanced heart failure,” Dr. Mather explains. “At Jefferson, we offer a wide variety of treatment options.”

For more information
Make an appointment with a Jefferson physician online or by calling 1-800-JEFF-NOW.