A new high-tech help for young heart patients has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Doctors say this will allow them to save more lives, an important milestone as we kick off American Heart Month.
It’s a little device with a big job.
“It does all the work for your heart,” Katrina Penney, 21, said. “It did save my life, 100%.”
It is the Impella 5.5 – the world’s smallest heart pump that helps blood circulate.
“So, I had my Impella for five weeks,” she said. “I actually named my Impella, Ella.
“It’s very useful in the sense that actually it can be implantable without opening the chest,” Dr. Katsuhide Maeda with Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia said.
Maeda said the FDA has now approved the Impella that he put in Penney for use in younger children.
“We are so excited,” Maeda said. “This is a really like a, you know, game-changer.”
It’ll save more lives, Maeda added.
With the Impella, Penney survived until her second heart transplant in June of 2023.
“I know it’s crazy that this little tiny device — and this being probably the size of my fingernail — can completely save someone’s life, which is just incredible,” Penney said.
See the full coverage: Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia doctor excited after world’s smallest heart pump FDA-approved for kids
