Safely Increasing Heart Transplantation with Donation after Cardiac Death

Heart failure affects more than 6 million persons in the United States. Advanced heart failure, which may result in refractory symptoms, frequent hospitalizations, and death, occurs in an estimated 15% of persons who receive a diagnosis of systolic dysfunction.1 Of these hundreds of thousands of persons, a few thousand receive a heart transplant each year — but 9% of patients on the transplantation list die waiting.2 Safely increasing the number of heart donors is critical to meeting demand. The current pool of suitable hearts is small and relies on donor hearts obtained after declaration of brain death. In the absence . . .