The Health Alliance of Greater Cincinnati says it has temporarily suspended the city's only adult heart transplant program because of a fungus found during a renovation project.

        The program at University Hospital will not perform any heart transplants until construction is finished, which could take three or four months, said Dr. Santosh Menon, co-director of the UC heart failure and cardiac transplant program.

Dr. Santosh Menon announces the temporary closure of UC's heart transplant program (Brandi Stafford photo) | ZOOM |

        If an organ becomes available for a patient during that time, the patient would be transferred to the Cleveland Clinic for the operation, he added.

        UC's program usually conducts 20 to 22 heart transplants a year; last year it performed 17. Its one-year survival rate exceeds 90 percent, officials said.

        More than two dozen local residents are on the waiting list for heart transplants there, according to LifeCenter, the agency that manages local organ donations.

        The fungus was found about two weeks ago in the coronary surgical intensive care unit, a bay of rooms on the second floor reserved for patients recovering from heart transplant surgery.

        The rooms are on the same floor as the hospital's surgical intensive care unit, where patients recover from many types of surgery, including kidney and liver transplants. Those rooms will not be closed.

        The fungus is a “nonpathogenic” species of Aspergillis.

        Pathogenic forms of Aspergillis can be life-threatening to organ transplant patients because the patients take drugs that suppress their immune systems, making them vulnerable to infections. Although the fungus in this case is not considered dangerous, the hospital decided not to take any chances, Dr. Menon said.

        Dr. Tom Ivey, chairman of the group of doctors who perform heart transplants at University Hospital, did not attend Friday's press conference. Instead, he issued a prepared statement:

        “Our cardiac surgeons have built the transplant program at University Hospital into one of the country's most highly respected transplant units,” Dr. Ivey wrote.

        “We are proud of our successes and disappointed that the heart transplant program at University Hospital will encounter this interruption. We applaud the decision of the Alliance to suspend the program and undertake the renovations and planned upgrades.”

        Heart transplant patients who attended Friday's press conference said they support the hospital's decision, even though it could mean traveling to Cleveland for care. One man also criticized the Enquirer for printing a story about the impending change before it was announced.

        “Some of the information released prior to (the announcement) was quite upsetting to very many of us,” said John Silvati, a 63-year-old Kenwood resident who is waiting for a heart transplant.

        “I know that what they have done is for our benefit. It makes great sense to me.”

        The decision to suspend the program over a nonpathogenic fungus raised questions among other transplant experts.

        “When a fungus like this is found, most institutions can find alternative wards to address the needs of such patients,” said Dr. William Abraham, co-director of the Gill Heart Institute at the University of Kentucky in Lexington.

        Also, when Aspergillis is found, usually the concern is not limited to heart transplant patients.

        “Any organ transplant patient can be subject to the same types of infection,” Dr. Abraham said.

        But Cincinnati's heart transplant program had to be suspended, Dr. Menon said, be cause there was no other part of University Hospital where heart transplant patients could be moved during the construction.

        It's not necessary to close the hospital's entire surgical intensive care unit, he said.

        Kidney and liver transplant patients stay on the second floor only briefly before moving to the sixth floor, and the rooms they use are well away from the heart transplant rooms, said Karen Bankston, vice president of patient care services.

        Summer Collins, a 21-year-old Blue Ash resident, is one of two patients staying at University Hospital awaiting a heart transplant. She has been there since October, and since Jan. 8 has been living with the help of an artificial pump called a left-ventricle assist device.

        She said she isn't concerned about where she gets a transplant, as long as she gets one.

        “I just hope when it's time (to get a transplant), the Lord will tell me where to go,” she said.

        In addition to the Cleveland Clinic, there are heart transplant programs in Lexington, Louisville, Columbus and Indianapolis.
       

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