Advanced Heart Failure and Transplantation
The Temple Heart Center's multi-disciplinary approach is staffed by more than a hundred caregivers. This experienced team of physicians, nurses, therapists and other professionals enables Temple to handle the most complex cardiac cases, providing everything your heart needs from diagnosis to emergency treatments to transplantation.
Having managed thousands of patients with advanced heart failure, Temple Heart Center staff is proud to offer the world's most advanced treatments. The goal at Temple is to tailor treatment to each individual patient, exhausting every possible option before turning to device implantation, surgery, or transplant. New drug trials, minimally invasive therapies, and cardiac rehabilitation are key components when providing the safest and most appropriate course of treatment for each patient.
Today, we have experience with over 200 mechanical assist device patients, and continue to treat critically ill heart failure patients with these life-saving pumps, offering patients improved quality of life whether the indication is bridge to recovery, bridge to transplant or destination therapy. We also use several home infusion protocols to allow patients to maintain a stable heart status when oral medications are no longer adequate.
Temple performed the first heart transplant in the Delaware Valley in 1984 and the first heart-lung transplant in 1988. Surgeons at our hospital have performed more transplants than most national centers in addition to handling some of the country’s most complicated cases. Our integrated cardiopulmonary transplant team performs complex heart-lung transplants only a few centers in the country are capable of. With an extensive, proprietary database at our fingertips, we have the ability to compare cases across a span of almost 1,000 transplant patients.
Our team consists of a multidisciplinary group of over twenty specialists and sub-specialists who ensure quality patient care from initial evaluation through the post-transplant period. Patients with co-morbidities also benefit from the expertise of multiple specialists experienced in the care of transplanted patients. We currently manage over 500 post-transplant patients, some of whom have been with us for over 15 years.
To find an advanced heart failure and transplantation physician at Temple, please click here.
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Mechanical Circulatory Support Program
In heart failure, the heart is too weak to pump enough blood to meet the body's needs. When this happens, the person feels tired all the time. Common causes of heart failure are heart attack, high blood pressure, and diabetes.
Until recently, patients with advanced heart failure who were not helped by drugs often needed to stay in the hospital or receive a heart transplant. But there is a severe shortage of donor hearts. Many people wait months or years until a donor heart is found. And for many seriously ill patients, transplantation is not an option due to personal choice or because they are too old or have other medical conditions.
Now there is a new option for patients with end-stage heart failure. Mechanical Circulatory Support (MCS) devices are heart pumps. They take blood from inside a weakened heart chamber and then pump it back out into the circulation. They do not replace the heart but they powerfully assist it — and that's why they are sometimes called Ventricular Assist Devices (VADs).
The Temple Heart Center has one of the area's busiest and most successful MCS programs. We have been leaders in using MCS devises since they were introduced in 1992. Today our surgeons are experts with the newest generation of smaller reliable devices.
A large national study recently showed that these newer devices help patients feel much better and live longer than patients getting older devices or taking drug therapy alone.
Here at Temple, many patients have had improved outcomes with the new MCS devices. Before surgery, many patients were bed-ridden and dependent on intravenous heart drugs to stay comfortable. After insertion of the MCS device, many of these patients have returned home and resumed favorite activities — walking around the mall, playing golf, making trips to see the grandchildren, or returning to work. Most no longer need the powerful but risky intravenous heart drugs. Some have regained so much health and fitness that they now qualify for transplantation or other heart surgery that was previously considered too risky for their condition.
The MCS Program at Temple is committed to giving patients with advanced heart failure a longer and better life. Temple's cardiothoracic surgeons provide patients with a complete assessment and evaluation for advanced and combination therapy options. Because the Temple Heart Center maintains a fully integrated team, we are ideally positioned to provide the whole range of therapy options. When transplantation is not an option, our cardiothoracic surgeons are ready to offer patients a new-generation MCS device as permanent or short-term support.
We advise patients with advanced heart failure to explore all the new treatment options. Early evaluation and treatment will lead to the best results. Those patients who are already taking intravenous heart drugs, have worsening symptoms, or are making frequent trips to the emergency department are especially encouraged to talk with a Temple heart failure specialist about advanced treatment options such as MCS. Even older patients and those with other medical conditions may benefit from MCS devices. Enrollment in one of Temple's clinical trials of investigational therapies may also be of interest for those with advanced heart failure. Trials involving new drugs, special surgical procedures, and stem cell therapies (to regrow healthy heart muscle) are now underway at Temple.
Temple surgeons specialize in finding solutions for patients with severe heart failure. We offer all the latest treatment options — drugs, biological agents, surgery, transplantation, MCS devices and pacemakers, and emerging cell-based therapies — and we tailor a therapy plan for every patient. Our goal is to help our patients reach their greatest potential quality of life.
Call 215-707-5700 to make an appointment with a heart failure specialist on the Temple MCS team.
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