Permanent Implantation of the Jarvik-7 Total Artificial Heart: A Clinical Perspective

Abstract

In this issue ofTHE JOURNAL, DeVries 1 reports the clinical courses of four patients in whom Jarvik-7 total artificial heart (TAH) prostheses were implanted as permanent cardiac substitutes. All four patients subsequently suffered serious complications; despite these, three patients achieved survival with the TAH for intervals of 112, 488, and 620 days. The Jarvik-7 prosthesis is a direct descendant of the early series of pneumatically driven TAH prostheses developed by Willem Kolff, MD, and colleagues working first at The Cleveland Clinic and later at the University of Utah. 2 In February 1963, Michael E. DeBakey, MD, proposed that the federal government support an organized program to develop a TAH. 3 Established at the National Institutes of Health in 1964, the Artificial Heart Program had as its goals the development of a broad spectrum of devices for short-term circulatory and longterm ventricular assistance as well as the development of TAH