Author: Matt Batcheldor
Living liver donor program performs first transplant
Oct. 15, 2020—The Vanderbilt Transplant Center's newly launched living liver donor program allows relatives to donate part of their liver to their loved one, something only possible at select centers in the country.
Nurse-led training program in Guyana carries on
Oct. 8, 2020—Just weeks before the COVID-19 pandemic suspended international travel, Vanderbilt University Medical Center nurses completed two new educational initiatives in the South American country of Guyana, and a strong collaboration continues virtually in response to the coronavirus.
COVID patient’s heart-lung transplant is world’s first
Oct. 8, 2020—Vanderbilt University Medical Center has performed the world’s first dual heart-lung transplant of a COVID-19 patient.
Transplant program reaches milestone 10,000th procedure
Oct. 1, 2020—Vanderbilt University Medical Center has completed its 10,000th organ transplant, a monumental achievement representing nearly 60 years of life-saving work.
Heart Walk 2020
Sep. 24, 2020—The money is still rolling in, but the Greater Nashville Heart Walk has already raised $1.3 million in its fight against heart disease and stroke as well as to provide funding for public and professional education and community service programs.
New device may aid advanced heart failure patients
Sep. 17, 2020—Vanderbilt Heart and Vascular Institute (VHVI) has implanted its first V-Wave, an interatrial shunt device, as a part of a multi-center clinical trial.
Technique helped treat patient’s rare pulmonary disorder
Sep. 10, 2020—Sourav Panja, PhD, a postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Pediatrics at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, was working in his lab one evening last year when he began coughing up blood. Even breathing was becoming difficult.
VUMC Nursing’s ‘Boot Camp’ hones critical care skills
Sep. 9, 2020—About 250 nurse practitioners and physician assistants nationwide gathered over Zoom from Sept. 2-4 for the ninth annual ACNP/PA Critical Care Boot Camp, the first in its history to be entirely virtual, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Greater Nashville Heart Walk to go virtual on Sept. 12
Sep. 2, 2020—Instead of drawing thousands of walkers to the Vanderbilt campus, the 2020 American Heart Association (AHA) Greater Nashville Heart Walk will take place virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Four heart transplants performed in whirlwind 48 hours
Aug. 26, 2020—The Vanderbilt Transplant Center’s cardiac surgeons transplanted four hearts in one 48-hour stretch in August, thanks to VUMC’s perfusion and organ recovery teams traveling more than 4,000 miles across the country to obtain the donor organs.
Study suggests new threshold for diagnosing PAH
Aug. 13, 2020—Doctors diagnosing pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) — elevated pulmonary pressure due to an issue in the small vessels of the lung — rely on a hemodynamic threshold set in the early 1970s to determine whether patients would be candidates for pulmonary vasodilator therapy.
Congenital heart patient receives unexpected transplant
Aug. 12, 2020—For years, doctors told Piper Davis it was impossible to have a heart transplant. She was born with just one ventricle, or pumping chamber, instead of two. A generation ago, such patients didn’t survive into adulthood.
