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| HONEY BEE SECTION |
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| Year : 2017 | Volume
: 3
| Issue : 3 | Page : 132 |
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Heart transplant in the abdomen
Sandeep Seth
Department of Cardiology, AIIMS, New Delhi, India
| Date of Web Publication | 1-Feb-2018 |
Correspondence Address:
Dr. Sandeep Seth
Department of Cardiology, AIIMS, New Delhi
India
 Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None  | Check |
DOI: 10.4103/jpcs.jpcs_59_17
How to cite this article:
Seth S. Heart transplant in the abdomen. J Pract Cardiovasc Sci 2017;3:132 |
Orthotopic heart transplantation is the standard technique for end-stage heart failure management. Due to lack of donor hearts, many patients cannot be transplanted and alternates such as left ventricular (LV) assist devices are expensive. Heterotopic heart transplantation was started before orthotopic heart transplantation but then given up when orthotopic heart transplantation become successful. Heterotopic heart transplantation could be an option for patients where the donor heart has marginal function or the recipient has severe comorbidities or pulmonary artery hypertension. It has come in the news in India recently because of two news reports: of a heterotopic heart transplantation in the chest in Coimbatore by Dr. Prashanth Vaijyanth using a direct pulmonary artery anastomosis technique and recently dog experiments by Dr. KM Cherian of abdominal heart transplantations as a prelude to human experiments.[1],[2],[3],[4]
Abdominal heart transplantations have been done in rats [Figure 1], mice, and larger animals and have been used for immunology testing and various other studies. In one of these models, the donor superior vena cava (SVC) is attached to the recipient inferior vena cava (IVC), the pulmonary artery is connected to the left atrium or an atrial septal defect is created, and the IVC is closed. The flow therefore is from recipient IVC to donor SVC to right atrium > right ventricular > pulmonary artery > left atrium > LV > Ao to donor Aorta.
Animal models exist for such transplantations, but whether such a transplantation will help a patient with heart failure and actually work as an abdominal ventricular assist device can only be proven by further experimentation as the results in a normal heart will differ from the results from experiments in a circulation with heart failure.
| References | |  |
| 1. | Barnard CN, Losman JG. Left ventricular bypass. S Afr Med J 1975;49:303-12.  [ PUBMED] |
| 2. | Barnard CN, Wolpowitz A. Heterotopic versus orthotopic heart transplantation. Transplant Proc 1979;11:309-12. [ PUBMED] |
| 3. | Sade RM. Transplantation at 100 years: Alexis carrel, pioneer surgeon. Ann Thorac Surg 2005;80:2415-8. [ PUBMED] |
| 4. | Mann PJ, Markowitz J, Yater WM. Transplantation of the intact mammalian heart. Arch Surg 1933;26:219-24. |
[Figure 1]
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