Vienna Ventricular Assist Device Leader Begins Certification Training
for CardioWest temporary Total Artificial Heart
TUCSON, Ariz. (Business Wire EON) April 16, 2008 --
On April 14 and 15, Dr. Georg Wieselthaler, Clinical Director of
Mechanical Circulatory Support, and his team from Vienna General
Hospital at the University of Vienna completed the first phase of
certification training for the CardioWest™
temporary Total Artificial Heart (TAH-t) in Tucson.
Dr. Wieselthaler, a leader in the use of mechanical circulatory support
devices, was the first surgeon to implant both the MicroMed DeBakey Left
Ventricular Assist Device and the HeartWare HVAD. He has also implanted
other ventricular assist devices including the Terumo DuraHeart LVAS.
Dr. Wieselthaler is the Secretary General of the International Society
of Rotary Blood Pumps.
Vienna General Hospital is the 16th hospital in
Europe and the 33rd hospital in the world to
complete the first phase of CardioWest certification training. The third
phase of CardioWest certification training is the proctored first
implant of the artificial heart at that center.
Vienna General Hospital is the largest hospital in Austria, with 2,189
hospital beds. More than 300 years old, today Vienna General Hospital
treats nearly 95,000 in-hospital patients each year.
There are currently 24
CardioWest certified centers worldwide, with nine additional
hospitals undergoing the certification process. There are CardioWest
certified centers in the United States, Germany, France, Canada and
Austria. Hospitals in Sweden and Switzerland have also begun CardioWest
certification training.
The CardioWest artificial heart is the first and only FDA, Health
Canada and CE Mark approved temporary Total Artificial Heart in the
world. Originally designed as a permanent replacement heart, it is
currently approved as a bridge to human heart transplant for patients
dying from end stage biventricular failure. These patients are often
days, if not hours from death. Their survival depends on receiving a
matching donor heart or a CardioWest artificial heart as a bridge to
human heart transplant.
In the 10-year pivotal clinical study of the CardioWest artificial
heart (New
England Journal of Medicine 2004; 351: 859-867), 79 percent of
patients receiving the artificial heart survived to transplant. This is
the highest bridge-to-transplant rate for any heart device in the world.
There have been more than 715 implants of the CardioWest, accounting for
more than 125 patient years of life on the artificial heart.
MULTIMEDIA GALLERY http://www.businesswire.com/cgi-bin/mmg.cgi?eid=5659409
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