Teaching Documentation Tool: Building a Successful Discharge

The HeartMate VE LVAS is a device that provides cardiovascular support to patients waiting for a heart transplant. The authors describe the development of a tool used to educate patients who are discharged home with this device.

A teaching documentation tool was created for the education of patients with the HeartMate Vented Electric Left Ventricular Assist System (VE LVAS, Thoratec Corp, Pleasanton, Calif ). The HeartMate VE LVAS is a device that provides cardiovascular support to patients waiting for a heart transplant. This device allows those patients to wait at home rather than in the hospital. In the past, patients could wait in the hospital for up to a year, unable to be discharged without a transplant. Convalescing at home with the HeartMate VE LVAS allows patients to recover from some of the debilitating effects of their cardiac disease...