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A surgically implanted pediatric ventricular assist device (VAD) can support the heart and improve blood flow. Pediatric VAD surgery can help your child while waiting for a heart transplant or as a long-term alternative to a transplant.
The board-certified and fellowship-trained specialists at Norton Children’s Heart Institute, affiliated with the UofL School of Medicine, have the experience, skills and training to know when a pediatric VAD can help and whether it can be a long-term treatment itself.
If VAD surgery is right for your child, a specially trained pediatric cardiothoracic surgical team with extensive VAD experience will implant the device. The team will perform open heart surgery to attach the outflow and inflow tubing of the device to the heart and the aorta. Specialists will then attach the tubing to a pump outside the body that will act as a heart, mechanically pushing blood out to the arteries and pulling blood into the pump from the veins.
The VAD surgery team will teach you, your child and other caregivers about the device. Our team will closely watch children who qualify to be discharged from the hospital and educate community health care providers in caring for a VAD.
A pediatric VAD implant procedure requires experience, skill and training in the latest techniques and technologies.
Norton Children’s Heart Institute is the leading provider of pediatric heart care in Louisville and Southern Indiana.
Norton Children’s Heart Institute has a network of remote diagnostic and treatment services in Kentucky and Southern Indiana.