(EMAILWIRE.COM, December 07, 2007 ) PARIS – On Nov. 26 and 27, two hospitals from Italy, one from Germany and one from Switzerland received the first phase of certification training for implanting the CardioWest™ temporary Total Artificial Heart (TAH-t) in Paris.


The four hospitals spent two days learning proper patient selection, blood management techniques, surgical procedures and patient recovery protocol. During the training, the group bested the previous record for fastest surgical technique, set July 18, 2007, by Dr. Stephen Clayson of Intermountain Medical Center (formerly LDS Hospital) in Salt Lake City. Clayson has been implanting the artificial heart since the early 1990s.


A total of twenty hospital staff members participated in the CardioWest certification training. The hospitals and the implanting surgeons who participated included:

- The Heart Surgery Institute at the University of Padua (Italy)

- Prof. Dr. Gino Gerosa and Dr. Antonio Gambino

- University of Naples (Italy)

- Prof. Maurizio Cotrufo, Dr. Cristiano Amarelli, and Dr. Gianpaolo Romano

- Hannover Medical School (Germany)

- Prof. Dr. Martin Strüber and Frau Dr. Anna Meyer

- University Hospital Bern (Switzerland)

- PD Dr. Friedrich S. Eckstein


The final phase of certification training is the proctored first implant. The four hospitals are the 28th, 29th, 30th and 31st hospitals in the world to complete the first phase of certification training.

Today there are 22 TAH-t certified centers worldwide, with nine additional hospitals currently undergoing the certification process. There are already CardioWest certified centers in the United States, Germany, France, Canada and Austria. Sweden’s Sahlgrenska University Hospital completed its first phase of certification training in late August.


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The CardioWest TAH-t is the first and only FDA, Health Canada and CE approved temporary Total Artificial Heart in the world. Originally designed as a permanent replacement heart, it is currently approved as a bridge to human heart transplant for patients dying from end stage biventricular failure.

In the pivotal clinical study of the TAH-t published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM 2004; 351: 859-867), 79 percent of patients receiving the TAH-t survived to transplant, the highest survival rate for any device in the world.

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