Artificial Heart Device Used

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31576, 13 January 1968, Page 16

Artificial Heart Device Used

(N .Z.P. A.-Reuter—Copyright)

HOUSTON (Texas), January 12. The pioneer heart surgeon Dr Michael Debakey, had saved the life of a second patient with an artificial heart device, the Methodist Hospital in Houston disclosed.

An artificial heart chamber, first used successfully on a Mexican woman last year, was used again by the hospital’s cardiovascular team led by Dr Debakey to save the life of a young Jugoslav girl, the hospital said last night. The operation on 16-year-old Marta Acman of Sostany, Jugoslavia, was carried out on October 26 last but kept secret till now. Miss Acman’s life hung in the balance for several days after the operation but she was now recovering satisfactorily, a hospital spokesman said. She is still in the hospital being treated for a kidney complaint. The treatment involves use of an artificial kidney machine. Miss Acman spent 10 months in a hospital in Jugoslavia before entering the Methodist hospital on October 9. A medical bulletin at the time said she was suffering from “severe congestive heart failure” as a result of rheumatic heart disease and infection of the heart’s inner lining. Under the operation procedure developed by Dr De-

bakey, doctors replaced the mitral valve in her heart with an artificial one. The artificial left ventricle was connected to by-pass the natural left ventricle thus taking a load off the natural heart and giving it time to strengthen. The artificial heart chamber is not implanted in the chest but connected to the arteries carrying blood to and from the heart by tubes.