In their report entitled “Poor outcomes resulting from ventricular assist devices implanted in hospitals without dedicated ventricular assist device programs” (1), Dr Anyanwu and colleagues describe their experiences with 12 patients who had received ventricular assist device placement for cardiogenic shock from facilities that do not have long-term implantable device programs. They identified technical issues that contrib- uted to their poor outcomes. Their subsequent conclu- sions were that these patients should alternatively be placed on inotropes and an intra-aortic balloon pump and transferred to centers that ar more focused on mechanical support for therapy. I disagree with this approach.
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