Heart Failure Treatment

Advanced-Stage Heart Failure Treatments

Heart Transplantation

Some people have such severe heart failure that standard surgeries and medications will not adequately improve their symptoms, and they face imminent death. They may need to have their diseased heart replaced with a healthy donor heart. Heart transplants are a standard practice for treating advanced-stage heart failure (for eligible patients) and have dramatically improved the long-term survival and quality of life of thousands of people with severe heart failure.

In order to be a candidate for a heart transplant, you must have advanced-stage heart failure (NYHA Class IV) and have a life expectancy of less than one year if you do not get a heart. A significant constraint with heart transplants is that there simply are not enough hearts available. In the U.S. each year, only about 2,500 heart transplants are performed, while 25,000-50,000 people who could benefit from a heart transplant die each year.

Unfortunately, candidates for transplantation often have to wait more than one year before a suitable donor heart is found. However, there are various therapeutic options to support these patients while they await a donor organ. A VAD (ventricular assist device) may act as a Bridge-to-Transplantation, assisting the pumping function of the native heart, in order for some patients to recover end-organ function and improve physical conditioning while waiting for a donor heart to become available.

There are also many NYHA Class IV heart failure patients who do not qualify for heart transplantation due to other diseases or age. In these situations, long-term therapy with a VAD may be a viable option.*

*The NYHA Class IV patients with end-stage left ventricular failure who have received optimal medical therapy for at least 60 of the last 90 days, who have a life expectancy of less than two years, and who are not candidates for cardiac transplantation.