Successful heart transplant for heart failure patient 13 years ago

SGGPO 07/07/2023 21:31

On July 7, Prof. Dr. Pham Nhu Hiep, Director of Hue Central Hospital, said that the hospital's medical team had just gone through two difficult days, overcoming challenges to safely bring the "heart of Hanoi" back to Hue.

Doctors at Hue Central Hospital perform surgery on a patient.

Patient TVG (31 years old, residing in Thua Thien Hue) has been suffering from dilated cardiomyopathy - heart failure for 13 years. Currently, Mr. G. is receiving optimal medical treatment, but up to now, EF has decreased severely, heart function has not improved and he is waiting for the opportunity to have a heart transplant.

Immediately upon receiving information from the National Organ Transplant Coordination Center, at 2:14 p.m. on July 5, the organ transplant team at Hue Central Hospital was immediately activated.

At 5:30 p.m. on July 5, doctors took the patient's blood sample to Hanoi on a Vietnam Airlines flight. The organ distribution plan was constantly changing due to the need to calculate the compatibility between the time of heart extraction and the flights on July 6.

As soon as the organ removal surgery was officially scheduled for 5:20 p.m. on July 6, the Hanoi-Hue flight had only one last flight taking off 2 hours later. However, the actual time to remove the heart from the chest was longer than expected.

Successful heart transplant for heart failure patient 13 years ago photo 1

Patient G. is now stable.

“The heart is coming out”, “The heart is on the bus”, “Has the heart left for the airport yet?”, “Hopefully in time” are the hurried, anxious messages from the board of directors and the organ transplant team at Hue Central Hospital.

Bamboo Airways also provided maximum support for all flight procedures, forcing 159 passengers to apologize for about 23 minutes to wait for the "heart" to fly back to Hue.

With those efforts, the heart landed at Phu Bai Airport (Hue) at 9:25 p.m. on July 6, and arrived at the Cardiovascular Center - Hue Central Hospital after about 23 minutes.

As soon as the news of the safe landing was received, the surgical team began the heart transplant steps in about 1 hour and 19 minutes. At 11:39 p.m. on July 6, the heart was beating again in Mr. G.'s chest.

One day after the heart transplant, the patient was extubated and fully conscious. Hemodynamic and biochemical parameters were stable, and heart function was good.

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