Doctors usually recommend LVAD surgery to those who have difficulties making their heart function. An LVAD helps your heart maintain constant pumping, thereby generating blood flow to the body. It is usually implanted within the patient’s body through open-heart surgery. Even though an LVAD can be lifesaving, it is inflicted with severe risk factors.
Things to Consider While Choosing the Best LVAD
Patients with a terrific and severe heart condition require assistance and cure at the earliest. There might be times when the patient is incapable of undergoing a heart transplant or cannot find a suitable donor. So if the patient’s condition is extensively severe, they cannot wait for long. And that is when doctors recommend their patients undergo LVAD surgery.
Doctors lookout for certain things to know whether LVAD treatment is the right option for their patient’s condition. They are:
- Presence of any other critical medical conditions.
- The intense probability of heart failure.
- The patients’ mental health and their potential to take care of an LVAD.
- The capacity of consuming blood thinners.
- The intensity of the patient’s progenitors’ mental, social, and financial support.
- Checking the condition of how well the heart’s pumping chambers are working.
Things to Expect After an LVAD Implant Procedure
After successfully implanting the LVAD, patients are released from the heart-lung bypass machine. This will pave the way and allow your LVAD to start functioning correctly, thereby pumping blood. Post LVAD implantation surgery, patients are usually kept in intensive care units.
This helps the entire team of doctors to adjust their patient’s heart treatments as and when required. Besides, they also monitor for any significant complications post-LVAD implant surgery. While patients are kept under constant invigilation in the ICU, they receive –
- The catheter is attached to the urinary tract for draining urine from the bladder.
- Plenty of fluids and medications are provided by the IV.
- Multiple antibiotics for eliminating infections.
- Tubes are attached to drain the fluid and blood from the chest and the heart.
- Blood thinners for preventing clots, thereby allowing easy flow of blood.
Patients remain connected to a ventilator until and unless they can breathe independently.
The Road to Recovery
Once the patient has somewhat recovered, they will not be required to stay in the ICU. They are usually moved to the cardiac step-down unit for recovering entirely. Some patients need the assistance of physical therapists, nurses and occupational therapists. They will help the patients to become highly active, thereby rebuilding their strength functionalities and becoming more active.
In this stage, patients are trained on using the newly implanted LVAD. From the technicalities of the LVAD to the ways of changing the dressings around the driveline exit site.
To Conclude
There might be times when patients with LVAD implantation feel pretty frustrated and anxious. So it is always better to have friends and family by their side only to keep their spirits high. For more details regarding post LVAD surgery, get in touch with experts of Max Healthcare. Implanting an LVAD offers aid for the heart to function correctly; otherwise not possible. LVAD surgery helps in returning to the regular routines and activities of life.
