Phoenix Man Is 2nd Patient to Receive Artificial Heart This Year
A man was in critical but stable condition Sunday after receiving an air-driven artificial heart, the second such implant this year, officials said.
Gaylord Booth, 48, of Phoenix was admitted Thursday to University Medical Center. He suffered from ischemic cardiomyopathy, a heart malfunction caused by poor blood supply to the heart muscle caused by coronary artery disease.
Dr. Jack Copeland, UMC’s chief of cardiovascular and thoracic surgery, said Booth was stable until Saturday, when his condition rapidly deteriorated. Doctors installed the device during a four-hour operation.
“He was in extremely critical condition, and we determined the CardioWest device was the only option to save his life,” Copeland said.
News of the implant was released Sunday.
Copeland and his UMC transplant team implanted a CardioWest heart into a 46-year-old Scottsdale, Ariz., woman on Jan. 11.
Sharoyn Loughran, the nation’s first artificial heart recipient since April, 1991, was in serious but stable condition Sunday at UMC, where she is awaiting a human heart transplant. No timetable has been set for that operation.
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