Outside the Beltway

Dick Cheney Has Heart Pump Installed

Former Vice-President Cheney has apparently entered a far grimmer phase of his chronic heart problems than many realized.

Doug Mataconis · Thursday, July 15, 2010 · 6 comments

We learned yesterday that former Vice-President Cheney had a pump installed in his heart this week:

Former Vice President Dick Cheney disclosed Wednesday that he has undergone surgery to install a small pump to help his heart work, as the 69-year-old enters a new phase of what he called ”increasing congestive heart failure.”

”The operation went very well and I am now recuperating,” a still-hospitalized Cheney said in a statement.

The kind of heart pump that Cheney received can be implanted next to the heart to help its main pumping chamber, the left ventricle, pump blood through the body. Such devices are used mainly for short periods, to buy potential transplant candidates time as they await a donor organ.

But they are being studied for use as a permanent therapy for people with severe heart failure who aren’t transplant candidates.

(…)

The heart pump Cheney received, known as an LVAD for short, is not a cure, said Dr. Samer Najjar, medical director of the heart transplant and LVAD division at Washington Hospital Center. But by rerouting the blood to take over the job of the left ventricle, the pump relieves pressure on the heart.

And once patients recover from the open-heart surgery, they can experience a much better quality of life, said Najjar, who has had LVAD recipients go back to work or resume hobbies like bowling. Najjar had no firsthand information about Cheney’s case.

The typical life expectancy of the recipient depends on whether the device is to be temporary and the person goes on to receive a heart transplant, or if the device is intended for permanent therapy. Recent studies suggest that 63 percent of patients who receive a permanent LVAD can survive two years, Najjar said. Those awaiting a heart transplant tend to have a slightly higher survival.

The details of Cheney’s scenario were not immediately available.

”The expectation is he is going to have an improved quality of life for some time to come,” Najjar said.

Cheney said a few weeks ago it became clear he was ”entering a new phase of the disease when I began to experience increasing congestive heart failure.”

In some corners, there are medical experts weighing in with what seems to be a grim prognosis:

Reading between the lines, you’re left with the distinct impression that Cheney, 69, is entering the late stages of congestive heart failure, that his prognosis is not very good, and that the available treatment options are very limited. That’s my lay person rendering after a close read of this afternoon’s reports. Here’s a more informed read from TPM Reader JK:

I’m a surgeon and just read your wire story about Dick Cheney getting a Left Ventricular Assist Device (LVAD) placed. The story downplays the seriousness of that procedures…once you’ve got an LVAD in place, it means your heart is essentially incapable of working on its own and has no potential to improve. While LVAD outcomes have been improving, and some patients live months or even years with one of these devices in place, this is a HUGE operation with MAJOR associated morbidity and mortality. If he’s not listed for a heart transplant, his days are seriously numbered. Life on an LVAD isn’t something I’d wish on my worst enemy…an axiom that this situation really tests. He’s in for a rough time.

According to some television reports I saw last night, one of the side-effects of the LVAD is that, because of the way it functions, the patient may no longer have a measurable pulse. Additionally, Cheney will be required to carry battery packs for the pump at all times and will essentially have to remain plugged in to an electrical outlet when he sleeps at night. Clearly, the former Vice-President has entered a far more serious phase of his heart problems than we’ve seen before.