Friday, May 21, 2004
And an article from my local paper, the Austin American-Statesman, Metro & State section, Friday, May 21, 2004:
Small heart pump making big difference to patients
Small devices becoming a way to return patients to normal lives while they wait for transplants
By Juan A. Lozano
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Friday, May 21, 2004
HOUSTON -- A small blood pump bolstered not only 19-year-old Everardo Flores' failing heart but also his self-esteem.
"When I was in school, I would fall asleep in every class. I thought I couldn't learn," said Flores, who in November became the first U.S. patient to receive the next generation in heart pumps. "It was just I was so tired. But then they put the pump in, and there hasn't been a limit. . . . I feel good with it."
Flores is one of many patients who have received left ventricular assist devices at the Texas Heart Institute, which for more than 30 years has pioneered work in the development of this medical technology. Unlike earlier, bulkier pumps, the one Flores has weighs 12 ounces and is 2 1/2 inches long.
On Thursday, doctors with the institute, Flores and three other patients with heart failure discussed the benefits of this apparatus on the eve of a symposium that will delve into the pumps' history and future.
Doctors say the heart pumps are evolving from stopgap devices to permanent implants that can provide long-term care to some patients.
The device was created to help the heart's left ventricle, a large muscular chamber that pumps blood out to the body. Failing hearts become unable to circulate enough blood. A left ventricular assist device helps with the pumping and can keep a person alive until a new heart can be found.
"As many as 70,000 to 80,000 Americans are homebound with heart failure," said Dr. O.H. "Bud" Frazier, chief of cardiopulmonary transplantation at the heart institute, based at St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital. "Many can be returned to active lives while they wait for a transplant."
Since the 1980s, more than 5,000 patients worldwide have been helped by these heart pumps. The landmark research in their creation was initiated by world-renowned and Houston-based heart surgeon Dr. Michael DeBakey, who will speak at the symposium at St. Luke's, scheduled for today and Saturday.
For almost three years, Thurston Davis has continued his normal, busy life while he waits for a new heart.
Davis, 32, works at a barbershop in northwest Houston and helps take care of his two children, who were born after he received his first heart pump. He got a second pump in August.
"I never thought I would be able to do any of this because you feel you're going to be limited" after getting the device, he said.
Guillermo Torre-Amione, an assistant professor at Baylor College of Medicine, said that although up to 60,000 people could be eligible for a heart transplant each year, only about 2,200 are performed because of few available organs.
Dr. Stephen Westaby, a senior cardiac surgeon at Oxford University in England, said the supply of available hearts will never meet the demand. Doctors at Thursday's news conference said heart pumps will become less a bridge to transplant and more a way to return patients to health and normal lives.
"This is going to be the wave of the future," Westaby said. "There are 20 more blood pumps in development of the miniature kind. Artificial heart technology has never been in a better (state). It all started and continues in Houston."
Though various heart pumps are going through clinical studies around the country, only the HeartMate, a pump Frazier helped pioneer in the 1980s, has been approved for use by the Food and Drug Administration.
That has been somewhat frustrating for many doctors.
"There are barriers that are regulatory and there are scientific barriers," said Frazier, who has implanted more than 250 of the devices, more than anyone in the world.
Small heart pump making big difference to patients
Small devices becoming a way to return patients to normal lives while they wait for transplants
By Juan A. Lozano
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Friday, May 21, 2004
HOUSTON -- A small blood pump bolstered not only 19-year-old Everardo Flores' failing heart but also his self-esteem.
"When I was in school, I would fall asleep in every class. I thought I couldn't learn," said Flores, who in November became the first U.S. patient to receive the next generation in heart pumps. "It was just I was so tired. But then they put the pump in, and there hasn't been a limit. . . . I feel good with it."
Flores is one of many patients who have received left ventricular assist devices at the Texas Heart Institute, which for more than 30 years has pioneered work in the development of this medical technology. Unlike earlier, bulkier pumps, the one Flores has weighs 12 ounces and is 2 1/2 inches long.
On Thursday, doctors with the institute, Flores and three other patients with heart failure discussed the benefits of this apparatus on the eve of a symposium that will delve into the pumps' history and future.
Doctors say the heart pumps are evolving from stopgap devices to permanent implants that can provide long-term care to some patients.
The device was created to help the heart's left ventricle, a large muscular chamber that pumps blood out to the body. Failing hearts become unable to circulate enough blood. A left ventricular assist device helps with the pumping and can keep a person alive until a new heart can be found.
"As many as 70,000 to 80,000 Americans are homebound with heart failure," said Dr. O.H. "Bud" Frazier, chief of cardiopulmonary transplantation at the heart institute, based at St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital. "Many can be returned to active lives while they wait for a transplant."
Since the 1980s, more than 5,000 patients worldwide have been helped by these heart pumps. The landmark research in their creation was initiated by world-renowned and Houston-based heart surgeon Dr. Michael DeBakey, who will speak at the symposium at St. Luke's, scheduled for today and Saturday.
For almost three years, Thurston Davis has continued his normal, busy life while he waits for a new heart.
Davis, 32, works at a barbershop in northwest Houston and helps take care of his two children, who were born after he received his first heart pump. He got a second pump in August.
"I never thought I would be able to do any of this because you feel you're going to be limited" after getting the device, he said.
Guillermo Torre-Amione, an assistant professor at Baylor College of Medicine, said that although up to 60,000 people could be eligible for a heart transplant each year, only about 2,200 are performed because of few available organs.
Dr. Stephen Westaby, a senior cardiac surgeon at Oxford University in England, said the supply of available hearts will never meet the demand. Doctors at Thursday's news conference said heart pumps will become less a bridge to transplant and more a way to return patients to health and normal lives.
"This is going to be the wave of the future," Westaby said. "There are 20 more blood pumps in development of the miniature kind. Artificial heart technology has never been in a better (state). It all started and continues in Houston."
Though various heart pumps are going through clinical studies around the country, only the HeartMate, a pump Frazier helped pioneer in the 1980s, has been approved for use by the Food and Drug Administration.
That has been somewhat frustrating for many doctors.
"There are barriers that are regulatory and there are scientific barriers," said Frazier, who has implanted more than 250 of the devices, more than anyone in the world.
Thanks, Rick, for passing along this article!
Dual-chamber pacemakers can cut death risk up to 50% Study is the largest
yet of heart failure device
By Steve Sternberg
USA TODAY
Devices that synchronize the two halves of the failing heart and shock
hearts that falter cut the risk of death by more than one-third, a study
reports today.
The study, called Companion, involved 1,520 patients with heart failure,
progressive weakening of the heart muscle. It is the first major test of
dual-chamber pacemaker defibrillators in patients with heart failure from
all causes. The devices cut deaths plus hospitalizations by 34%.
As for death rates alone, the pacemakers reduced mortality by 36% overall
-- and by 50% in people whose heart failure did not result from a heart
attack. That's in addition to the 30% reduction patients get from the
best medication, says study leader Michael Bristow of the University of
Colorado-Denver.
''A 50% reduction in mortality is unbelievably large, especially on top
of medical therapy,'' Bristow says. ''It should become the standard of
care in this population.''
The risk of death dropped by 27% in people who developed heart failure
after having a heart attack, says the study in today's New England
Journal of Medicine.
A separate study of 458 heart failure patients, reported in the same
journal, found that defibrillators cut the risk of death from rhythm
disturbances almost in half, from 14% to 8%.
Two years ago, positive findings from a study called Madeit II prompted
Medicare and private insurers to pay for the $30,000 device, but only for
those with heart failure from heart attacks.
Roughly 5 million Americans have heart failure, also caused by viral
infection, alcoholism, high blood pressure, clogged arteries and factors
still unknown. Doctors say as many as 100,000 could benefit from the
special pacemakers, because the electrical pulses controlling their
heartbeat take longer to cross from one pumping chamber to another.
''These devices have great promise,'' says David Meyerson of Johns
Hopkins University and the American Heart Association. ''We're seeing
improved functional capacity, fewer hospitalizations and improved
survival beyond that from the best medicines alone.''
Some doctors have asked whether the device's expense will drain Medicare,
but Beverly Lorell, chief medical officer for Guidant, the study's
sponsor, says her company's device prevents costlier hospitalizations.
Hospital costs for heart failure are staggering, she says. Hospital bills
account for $14 billion of the $24 billion that will be spent on heart
failure in the USA this year. She says a study is underway to determine
whether the device is cost-effective.
© Copyright 2004 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.
Dual-chamber pacemakers can cut death risk up to 50% Study is the largest
yet of heart failure device
By Steve Sternberg
USA TODAY
Devices that synchronize the two halves of the failing heart and shock
hearts that falter cut the risk of death by more than one-third, a study
reports today.
The study, called Companion, involved 1,520 patients with heart failure,
progressive weakening of the heart muscle. It is the first major test of
dual-chamber pacemaker defibrillators in patients with heart failure from
all causes. The devices cut deaths plus hospitalizations by 34%.
As for death rates alone, the pacemakers reduced mortality by 36% overall
-- and by 50% in people whose heart failure did not result from a heart
attack. That's in addition to the 30% reduction patients get from the
best medication, says study leader Michael Bristow of the University of
Colorado-Denver.
''A 50% reduction in mortality is unbelievably large, especially on top
of medical therapy,'' Bristow says. ''It should become the standard of
care in this population.''
The risk of death dropped by 27% in people who developed heart failure
after having a heart attack, says the study in today's New England
Journal of Medicine.
A separate study of 458 heart failure patients, reported in the same
journal, found that defibrillators cut the risk of death from rhythm
disturbances almost in half, from 14% to 8%.
Two years ago, positive findings from a study called Madeit II prompted
Medicare and private insurers to pay for the $30,000 device, but only for
those with heart failure from heart attacks.
Roughly 5 million Americans have heart failure, also caused by viral
infection, alcoholism, high blood pressure, clogged arteries and factors
still unknown. Doctors say as many as 100,000 could benefit from the
special pacemakers, because the electrical pulses controlling their
heartbeat take longer to cross from one pumping chamber to another.
''These devices have great promise,'' says David Meyerson of Johns
Hopkins University and the American Heart Association. ''We're seeing
improved functional capacity, fewer hospitalizations and improved
survival beyond that from the best medicines alone.''
Some doctors have asked whether the device's expense will drain Medicare,
but Beverly Lorell, chief medical officer for Guidant, the study's
sponsor, says her company's device prevents costlier hospitalizations.
Hospital costs for heart failure are staggering, she says. Hospital bills
account for $14 billion of the $24 billion that will be spent on heart
failure in the USA this year. She says a study is underway to determine
whether the device is cost-effective.
© Copyright 2004 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.
Wednesday, May 19, 2004
Animal Trustees of Austin is putting together a vegetarian cookbook as a fundraiser. Since so many of these recipes are vegetarian - several of them vegan, even - I went ahead and contributed them to the cookbook, odd comments and all.
I try and stay involved in the animal rescue community, even though I don't run Guinea Pig Rescue of Austin any more. Next month, the House Rabbit Resource Network is having a rabbit-themed garage sale. Since I have enough rabbit craft kits to last me if I lived to be 100, never mind my current expected life span of rather less than that, I am sorting through them to donate some. Rabbit patterns. Stuffed rabbits, wood rabbits, styrofoam rabbits, quilted rabbits. We have one entire spare bedroom devoted to assorted arts and crafts, with a workbench, power tools, sewing machine, knitting machine, spare computer, sheets of Coroplast, rabbit-cage-building materials, etc. (This house does not have a garage, so we can't set up a workshop in the garage.) For some odd reason, we seem to have several cordless drills - more than there are humans in the household - as well as more than two toolboxes. We counted up glue guns once - we found seven of them, and who knows how many more are lurking somewhere.
Since I've had more time to sit around, I've also been knitting. I know, I know, everybody says "Oh, my grandmother does that!" Well, other people besides grandmothers do it, too! It's a very relaxing craft, good for blood pressure, heart rate, alpha waves, stress reduction in general - ideally suited for the heart failure patient. Of course, an avid knitter spends way too much buying yarn, but on the other hand, look what one can save by giving all one's relatives hand-knitted scarves and hats for holiday presents! (And they're lightweight to pack in one's luggage when one is going to be going through several airports during holiday travels!) My local yarn shop is Hill Country Weavers.
Another article about knitting and stress reduction - this one, I take pains to point out, from Case Western Reserve, an engineering university.
I try and stay involved in the animal rescue community, even though I don't run Guinea Pig Rescue of Austin any more. Next month, the House Rabbit Resource Network is having a rabbit-themed garage sale. Since I have enough rabbit craft kits to last me if I lived to be 100, never mind my current expected life span of rather less than that, I am sorting through them to donate some. Rabbit patterns. Stuffed rabbits, wood rabbits, styrofoam rabbits, quilted rabbits. We have one entire spare bedroom devoted to assorted arts and crafts, with a workbench, power tools, sewing machine, knitting machine, spare computer, sheets of Coroplast, rabbit-cage-building materials, etc. (This house does not have a garage, so we can't set up a workshop in the garage.) For some odd reason, we seem to have several cordless drills - more than there are humans in the household - as well as more than two toolboxes. We counted up glue guns once - we found seven of them, and who knows how many more are lurking somewhere.
Since I've had more time to sit around, I've also been knitting. I know, I know, everybody says "Oh, my grandmother does that!" Well, other people besides grandmothers do it, too! It's a very relaxing craft, good for blood pressure, heart rate, alpha waves, stress reduction in general - ideally suited for the heart failure patient. Of course, an avid knitter spends way too much buying yarn, but on the other hand, look what one can save by giving all one's relatives hand-knitted scarves and hats for holiday presents! (And they're lightweight to pack in one's luggage when one is going to be going through several airports during holiday travels!) My local yarn shop is Hill Country Weavers.
Another article about knitting and stress reduction - this one, I take pains to point out, from Case Western Reserve, an engineering university.
