Post-heart transplantation outcome of HeartMate II-bridged recipients requiring unplanned concomitant temporary right ventricular mechanical support

OBJECTIVES: Second-generation axial-flow left ventricular assist devices (LVADs) have become an established therapy in bridging endstage heart failure patients to cardiac transplantation. Despite the proven clinical success of these devices, some patients develop right ventricular (RV) failure after LVAD implantation. We sought to determine post-heart transplantation outcomes of HeartMate II (HMII)-bridged patients who developed postimplantation right ventricular failure and received Levitronix CentriMag for RV support in addition to LVAD. METHODS: This was a single-centre institutional report of 64 patients transplanted during 2007-2013 from a HeartMate II device. Patients were divided into two groups according to whether they received an isolated LVAD (n = 56) or required additional RV mechanical support (n = 8). These two groups were compared for early graft loss (death before discharge or retransplantation), major early post-transplant complications and 3-year graft survival. RESULTS: Early graft loss was 10.7% in isolated HMII and 25% in HMII + RVAD patients (P = 0.26). There were no observed differences in the rates of primary graft dysfunction (7.3 vs 0%, P = NS), renal failure (16.7 vs 12.5%, P = NS) and stroke (11.1 vs 25%, P = 0.273) between the two groups. Pulmonary artery resistance (odds ratio: 3.286, 95% confidence interval: 1.063-10.157, P = 0.039) was identified as a significant predictor for adverse outcome of mechanically-bridged heart transplant recipients. The 3-year graft survival rate was 86 ± 5% in isolated HMII and 75 ± 15% in HMII + RVAD patients, P = 0.326. CONCLUSIONS: Our data demonstrate that heart transplant recipients who required unplanned RV mechanical support after LVAD implantation achieved comparable rates of early graft loss, post-transplant renal failure and stroke rate in comparison with patients bridged with an isolated HeartMate II assist device. Three-year graft survival was equivalent between those two groups. Given the small sample size, further studies involving more patients are needed to support or challenge our conclusions.