Link :
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/041018/323/f4tau.html
WASHINGTON (AFP) - US regulators announced approval of an artificial heart designed to keep a patient alive while awaiting a transplant.
The Food and Drug Administration approved the heart, made by Syncardia Systems, of Tucson, Arizona. It is implanted in the patient's chest to replace the right and left ventricles, which is the lower half of the heart.
The device is connected to an exterior console, which supplies the electrical charge that keeps it running, and monitors the patient's vital signs.
The agency said in a statement that it gave its green light based on clinical trials by the company as well as the recommendations of an independent group.
Syncardia has implanted the artificial heart in 81 patients who were awaiting transplants. Seventy-nine percent of them stayed alive long enough, an average of 79 days, to receive a transplant, the agency said.
About 4,000 US patients receive heart transplants annually. About 100 of them could be candidates for the new artificial heart.
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