TY - JOUR AU - Tasoulis, Athanasios AU - Tzanis, Georgios AU - Vasileiadis, Ioannis AU - Dimopoulos, Stavros AU - Karatzanos, Eleftherios AU - Nanas, Serafim AU - Charitos, Christos PY - 2019/07/01 Y2 - 2024/03/29 TI - Effects of left ventricular assist device implantation on respiratory drive JF - Health & Research Journal JA - HRJ VL - 5 IS - 2 SE - Original Articles DO - 10.12681/healthresj.20877 UR - https://ejournals.epublishing.ekt.gr/index.php/HealthResJ/article/view/20877 SP - 77-83 AB - <p><strong>Background:<em> </em></strong>Patients with heart failure (HF) suffer from ventilatory abnormalities that are related to poor prognosis.</p><p><strong>Aim:</strong> The aim of the study was to investigate the respiratory drive in HF patients early after left ventricular assist device (LVAD) implantation.<strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>We enrolled eight HF patients after LVAD (HeartMate II) implantation and 8 patients with advanced HF (control group).<strong> </strong>Patients were evaluated with cardiopulmonary exercise testing, respiratory function tests and transthoracic echocardiographic examination at 1, 3 and 6 months. Respiratory drive was estimated by the mouth occlusion pressure-P<sub>0.1</sub> and the P<sub>0.1</sub>/P<sub>imax</sub> ratio.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>LVAD patients at 1, 3 and 6 months after implantation had significantly improved P<sub>0.1</sub>/P<sub>imax</sub>% ratio (4.17±0.43 vs 3.29±1.0 vs 2.56±0.35 respectively,p&lt;0.01) as well as significantly increased in P<sub>imax</sub>. No changes where observed in the HF control group. A significant decrease in LVEDD, LVESD and an improvement in LVEF is also observed during follow up.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Our results imply LVAD implantantion induces a progressive and significant improvement of respiratory drive and Left ventricle reverse remodeling during a 6 month follow-up period.</p> ER -