Università degli studi di Modena e Reggio Emilia

Università degli Studi di Modena e Reggio Emilia
Corso di laurea in infermieristica - Sede di Modena

Abstract

Heart failure is constantly growing in western societies. This is due to the progressive and growing population ageing and to the constant increase of this pathology risk factors. Even though the cardiac transplantation represents the best treatment for the advanced heart failure, it is not that easy to carry it out, either because of the little availability of donors, or because of the general conditions of the patients that cannot tolerate this treatment.
The introduction of the left ventricular assist device (LVAD) has changed the therapeutic prospective of these subjects. These devices were born to be implanted as bridge to the cardiac transplantation but their most important revolution of the last years led us to be able to use them for ”the destination therapy”. The second and last generation LVAD are pumps associated to a lower complication risk rather than the oldest ones. In particular, the Jarvik 2000 is a LVAD model easily tolerated, since it determines a noticeable improvement of the patients’ life quality.
The patients that use the LVAD need a multidimensional approach, which starts during the pre-surgery phase. Particularly, the nurse has a fundamental role. First of all, he supervises the patient during the intensive care and the inpatient wards, preventing and detecting every complication; secondly, he educates the patient and the caregiver of the devices management, of the self-care and of the precautions to have during the daily routine. The therapeutic education and the nursing care are essential to avoid psychological diseases for both the patient, who has to change his routine, and the caregiver, who has to give constant support and who can easily get stressed.