Miraculous heart transplant across Vietnam at Hue Central Hospital

Prof. Dr. Pham Nhu Hiep, Director of Hue Central Hospital, said that on March 2, he received information from the National Organ Transplant Coordination Center that a brain-dead person had donated tissues and organs in Ho Chi Minh City. The hospital immediately activated the organ coordination team. Doctors were assigned to coordinate with Gia Dinh People's Hospital and the National Organ Transplant Coordination Center to receive the organs.

After discussing and calculating the time to retrieve the heart at Gia Dinh People's Hospital (HCMC) and the time to prepare for the transplant at Hue Central Hospital, the heart was transported to Phu Bai Airport (Hue) at 6:54 p.m. on March 3.

According to doctors, this is a difficult organ transplant because the patient has dilated cardiomyopathy, end-stage heart failure EF 20%, TAPSE 15, PAPs 75mmHg, very severe pulmonary hypertension, poor response to medical treatment. The risk of heart failure and pulmonary hypertension after heart transplant surgery is very high, so it is necessary to have preventive treatment options after the transplant.

Heart transplant from brain-dead donor for NVC patient

In addition, the donor's heart also faced many challenges: long resuscitation time, high doses of vasopressors were used, heart quality was assessed during the first test as not guaranteed due to very high cardiac enzyme Troponin I-hs (increased >1000 times) and very high doses of Noradrenaline and Adrenaline were used.

After the third brain death consultation, re-evaluation and adjustments based on expert opinions such as reducing vasopressor use and close monitoring, the heart quality improved.

Heart transplant patients can eat and exercise on their own in the recovery bed.

After more than 3 hours of surgery, the donor's heart beat again in the patient's chest. However, the patient who received the heart transplant suffered from heart failure and severe post-transplant hypertension, making it difficult to wean off extracorporeal circulation. The patient was transferred to the intensive care unit for continued resuscitation.

After 3 days of ECMO support, the patient's hemodynamics were stable, pulmonary artery pressure was well controlled, ECMO and ventilator were removed, the patient ate and exercised lightly on the recovery bed, and hematological and biochemical tests were within normal limits.