OHIO — Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center is working on a groundbreaking treatment that would help those struggling with heart failure.
What You Need To Know
- Heart failure continues to be the world's leading cause for hospitalizations
- The center is the first in the world to be apart of the clinical trial where a device has been designed to alleviate heart failure
- The device alleviates pressure in the left side of the heart and reduces shortness of breath
- Doctors say the overall goal is to address re-hospitalization and reduction in quality of life
Dr. Scott Lilly, Interventional Cardiologist and Director of the Structural Heart Disease Program said the device is “Designed for treating patients that have heart failure, who are commonly experiencing shortness of breath.”
Lilly indicated that the shortness of breath comes when the pressure and volume on the left side of the heart is elevated.
If somebody is moving or walking around, he said “the heart is unable to empty it efficiently and so that blood can then back up into the lungs and cause congestion, making it a lot more difficult for patients to pull oxygen out of the air. So they experienced shortness of breath and other things.”
He noted that symptoms like shortness of breath contribute to hospitalizations and reduces quality of life.
While a 54-year-old man was the first in the clinical trial to use the device last year, other patients have since been added. The hope now is that the device can help more patients within the trial stay out of the hospital, which is part of a blinded study.