TAMPA, FL -- Getting enough blood and oxygen to the body after a heart attack is crucial to survival.
Heart doctors at Pepin Heart Hospital at UCH have a new device that is saving lives.
Doctors say it brought back a 54-year-old Zephyrhills man. “Your lungs are clear and your heart sounds normal. You are doing great my friend."
John Zweil is thankful to be alive. Six days ago he showed up at the ER at UCH. “My symptoms were angina and in my arms and legs. I had no feeling in my toes and I was having chest pains."
His weak heart was failing and he had blockages in arteries.
Interventional Cardiologist Reynaldo Mulintapang says, “You can see the left main artery has a blockage in there."
John needed bypass surgery but because his left ventricle only pumped at 20 percent, doctors feared he would die as soon as they gave him anesthesia.
Instead they used a new device called the Impella Pump, inserted through an artery in the groin, up into the heart to keep his own heart pumping while they opened his arteries in a cath lab without cracking his chest open.
"No more blockage." The doctor says.
20 hours later, the pump was slowly withdrawn and his own heart now pumps at 45 percent. A big life saving change.
