Palliative Care Clinicians Caring for Patients Before and After Continuous Flow-Left Ventricular Assist Device

Left ventricular assist devices (LVADs) are an available treatment option for carefully-selected patients with advanced heart failure. Initially developed as a bridge to transplantation, LVADs are now also offered to patients ineligible for transplantation as destination therapy (DT). Individuals with a DT-LVAD will live the remainder of their lives with the device in place. While survival and quality of life improve with LVADs compared to medical therapy, complications persist including bleeding, infection, and stroke.

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