Echocardiography in Cardiac Assist Devices

Cardiac Assist Devices

The Surgical Research Laboratory at Sinai Hospital of Detroit has as its primary goal the development of mechanical and biological technics for augmenting or replacing the function of a damaged heart. Scientific contributions from our group include the development of a cardiac pacemaker, a method for electronic control of bladder evacuation, technics for chronic stimulation of nerves, and a met...

Ventricular assist devices and non-cardiac surgery

The use of ventricular assist devices has expanded significantly since their approval by the Food and Drug Administration in the United States in 1994. In addition to this, the prevalence of heart failure continues to increase. We aim to provide an overview of perioperative considerations and management of these patients for non-cardiac surgery. We performed a Medline search for the words "vent...

How transoesophageal echocardiography can assist cardiac surgery in adults.

Cardiac Remodeling and Recovery: Lessons from Mechanical Ventricular Assist Devices

Cardiac injury, regardless of etiology, typically leads to an increase in wall stress, decreased compliance, reduced systolic function, and progressive chamber dilation. This process is termed “remodeling” and is associated with a worse prognosis in patients with heart failure. Several drugs have been shown to have an effect on inducing reverse remodeling or reducing ventricular dilatation, inc...

Optimization of Cardiac-Cycle Synchronized Control for Ventricular Assist Devices

Heart failure is one of the leading causes of death in the developed countries. The use of ventricular assist devices (VADs) is an option for treating patients with end-stage heart failure which is increasingly applied, while heart transplantation represents the gold standard therapy. The reason for the increased use is both due to a shortage of donor organs and the improvement of VAD technolog...