Even during wartime, innovation in science and medicine continues in Israel. A team of doctors at Rabin Medical Center in Petah Tikva performed an emergency mitral valve repair on a heart transplant patient in what is the first operation of its kind on a patient with cardiogenic shock, The Times of Israel reports.
Simon Fischler received a heart transplant when he was 14 years old due to heart disease. Two months ago, at the age of 47, he was admitted to Rabin Medical Center for a medical emergency when the left mitral valve of his transplanted heart suddenly stopped working and started leaking. The team of doctors performed an emergency procedure which repaired the unresponsive mitral valve. This kind of heart surgery has only been documented twice in medical history, and never on a patient in cardiogenic shock.
“His blood pressure continued to drop, and we decided to bring in all the team and try to do something that was the last resort,” [Prof. Leor] Perl said.
Together with Dr. Amos Levy, a senior physician from the Catheterization Lab, Dr. Yaron Shapira, head of Echocardiography, Dr. Ben Cohen, senior physician from the Echo Lab, and Dr. Ben-Ben Avraham, head of the Heart Failure Service, the doctors performed the emergency procedure.
Approaching the heart through the femoral vein, the team reached the heart, crossed from the right side to the left using a special needle to perform the puncture in the septum, ultimately carrying out the mitral repair in the beating heart in the least invasive way possible.
In the hours after the procedure, Fischler’s condition vastly improved. The next day, he was able to breathe on his own. The day after that, he was released from the hospital.
Of Israel’s population of 10.1 million, about 180,000 or 1.8% are estimated to be heart failure patients, with 30 to 40 transplants being performed in Israel annually. This groundbreaking procedure opens the door for more hope for patients receiving pivotal care in life-threatening emergencies.
