Initial clinical experiences of the ABIOMED® BVS system 5000® in JAPAN

The initial clinical experience of the ABIOMED® BVS SYSTEM 5000® in Japan is reported. The system is a paracorporeal pulsatile assist device intended for temporary ventricular support. It consists of a pneumatic drive console, a blood pump, and the atrial and arterial cannulas. The pump is of a dual chamber design, with the upper chamber as a passive, gravity filled resevoir and the lower chamber as a pumping chamber. Since the system is designed to be simple, safe and automatically controlled, no additional personnel is required to control perfusion. This report describes our initial clinical experiences with the ABIOMED® BVS SYSTEM 5000® in Japan. This device was used in three patients with post cardiotomy cardiogenic shock and fulminant myocarditis. The first patient developed acute occlusion of left main coronary artery who required emergent surgical revascularization following PTCA and stent implantation. He couldn’t wean from CPB and requied the insertion of an LVAD. The second case suffered from a cardiac arrest after CABG and could not be resuscitated. The ABIOMED® BVS 5000® was inserted and the patient successfully weaned from support. The third patient developed fulminant myocarditis and was supported with the system for 269 hours and was successfully weaned after near complete myocardial recovery. Our initial experience with the ABIOMED® BVS SYSTEM 5000 ® indicates that the system can provide complete cardiac support allowing full recovery from a cardiac variety of causes of dysfunction. The device has the potential to improve the survival rate of patients with severe acute recoverable myocardial damage. It is expected that this device can be a viable tool for treatment of intractable heart diseases. (J Jpn Assn Thorac Surg 1998; 46: 236-242)