Until now, patients with artificial hearts had to stay in the hospital until a
donor heart was available for transplant. The wait involved being hooked up to
an enormous machine weighing over 400 pounds, and could last years.Now, a new portable device from SynCardia Systems, Inc, called the “Freedom” driver allows patients waiting for a heart transplant the freedom to be out and about instead of in the hospital. Compact enough to fit into a backpack, users plug the device into a standard outlet at home.
Dr. M. Cristina Smith, director of University Medical Center’s Heart Transplant and Ventricular-Assist Device Services and assistant professor of surgery in the University of Arizona department of surgery, joins Arizona Illustrated to discuss the device, its development and the potential impact it could have on patient care. Read more and watch the video
Check out the latest July 2011 news from SynCardia:
University of Iowa Implants State’s 1st SynCardia Total Artificial Heart
July 21, 2011
SynCardia Systems, Inc., manufacturer of the SynCardia temporary Total Artificial Heart, announced today that University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics – the only comprehensive academic medical center in Iowa – has performed the state’s first implant of the Total Artificial Heart… read more
July 14, 2011
SynCardia Systems, Inc., manufacturer of the SynCardia temporary Total Artificial Heart (TAH-t), announced today that an article reporting the first use of the Freedom® portable driver with a Total Artificial Heart patient was published in the July issue of the Journal of Heart and Lung Transplantation… read more
July 7, 2011
SynCardia Systems, Inc. announced today that Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston performed its first implant of the SynCardia temporary Total Artificial Heart on May 22, to save the life of 17-year-old Jordan Merecka. Texas Children’s is the first pediatric hospital in the world to implant SynCardia’s Total Artificial Heart… read more
June 30, 2011
On June 14, Marvin J. Slepian, M.D., Professor of Medicine (Cardiology and Biomedical Engineering) at the University of Arizona and co-founder and chairman of SynCardia Systems, Inc., presented on the SynCardia temporary Total Artificial Heart during his keynote address at the TechConnect World Summit held in Boston… read more
1st Turkish Total Artificial Heart Patient
Discharged Using Freedom® Portable Driver
June 22, 2011
SynCardia Systems, Inc. manufacturer of the SynCardia temporary Total Artificial Heart, announced today that Florence Nightingale Hospital in Istanbul has discharged Turkey’s first Total Artificial Heart patient to wait for a matching donor heart at home using the Freedom® portable driver. Weighing 13.5 pounds, the Freedom driver is the world’s first wearable portable driver designed to power SynCardia’s Total Artificial Heart both inside and outside the hospital… read more