Abiomed Celebrates 25 Years of Heart Recovery with Impella®

DANVERS, Mass., Aug. 12, 2024 – Abiomed, Inc., part of Johnson & Johnson MedTech1, is celebrating 25 years of heart recovery by bringing together 25 patients to honor and celebrate their personal stories of heart recovery. The U.S. patients gathered at Abiomed headquarters in Danvers, Mass., to learn more about Impella technology, meet the operators who made the Impella heart pump used in their treatment and connect with other patients who have been treated with Impella.

The inventor of Impella technology and Abiomed’s chief technology officer, Thorsten Siess, PhD, joined the celebration on Aug. 1-2 and spoke about the history of Impella technology. Impella, the world’s smallest heart pump that allows the heart to rest and recover, was first used in 1999 in Belgium and has since been used to treat more than 330,000 patients globally. “The patients who joined us demonstrate the tremendous impact that heart recovery has on patients and their families,” said Andrew Greenfield, worldwide president of Abiomed. “We are humbled by their stories, which motivate us to innovate and work toward making heart recovery the global standard of care.” 

From Heart Failure to Heart Recovery 

With the help of medical innovation such as Impella heart pumps that can be inserted percutaneously, heart recovery has become possible. Previous studies have demonstrated that Impella-treated patients have shorter hospital lengths of stay and improved quality of life and Impella has the ability to reduce healthcare costs.2,3,4 “Seeing patients return to their families having recovered their native heart function and going on to live a fulfilling life never gets old,” said Mark Anderson5,MD, professor and chairman of the department of cardiac surgery at Hackensack University Medical Center / Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine in Hackensack, New Jersey. “I believe that every heart is recoverable until proven otherwise.”

In Plano, Texas, Baylor Scott & White’s The Heart Hospital has replaced heart failure with heart recovery in the name of its cardiac care clinic, demonstrating its commitment and vision for patients. “The Heart Recovery Center name reflects our treatment approach, which focuses on helping patients achieve native heart recovery,” said Aasim Afzal6,MD, MBA, medical director of mechanical circulatory support at the Heart Hospital – Baylor. “Our patients and their family members continue to provide positive feedback about how this shift has impacted their heart disease treatment journey.”

First National Heart Recovery Awareness Day Set for February

The benefits of heart recovery will be recognized during heart health month celebrated every February in the US. The first annual National Heart Recovery Awareness Day has been established through a congressional resolution to be celebrated on February 20, 2025. “Impella defined and continues to redefine heart recovery to address large global unmet needs in the cardiovascular space,” said Michael Bodner, group president, heart recovery & intravascular lithotripsy, Johnson & Johnson MedTech. “We are committed to continued innovation and helping patients return home – with their native heart – to their families and ways of life.”

About Impella Heart Pump

Impella CP® with SmartAssist® is U.S. FDA approved to treat certain advanced heart failure patients undergoing elective and urgent percutaneous coronary interventions (PCI), such as stenting or balloon angioplasty, to reopen blocked coronary arteries. 

Impella CP® with SmartAssist® and Impella 5.5® with SmartAssist® are U.S. FDA approved to treat heart attack or cardiomyopathy patients in cardiogenic shock.

Left-sided Impella devices work (Impella CP® with SmartAssist®, Impella 5.5® with SmartAssist®) by temporarily taking over the heart’s pumping function, pulling blood from the ventricle, and pushing it out into the aorta, delivering oxygen-rich blood to the rest of the body. This enables patients to return home with their native hearts and resume their lives with their families.

A randomized clinical trial presented at the American College of Cardiology conference and published within the New England Journal of Medicine (Moller, et al., New England Journal of Medicine, 7 Apr 2024) confirms an Impella linked survival benefit. It was found that routine use of Impella CP in patients who have had a heart attack with STEMI cardiogenic shock reduces 180-day mortality by 12.7% compared to the control arm (45.8% vs. 58.5%, p=0.04). The also authors stated that the increased risk of adverse events does not overshadow the benefit of treatment with Impella CP.

About Abiomed

Based in Danvers, Massachusetts, USA, Abiomed, Inc., part of Johnson & Johnson MedTech, is a leading provider of medical technology that provides circulatory support and oxygenation. Our products are designed to enable the heart to rest and recover by improving blood flow and/or provide sufficient oxygenation to those in respiratory failure. For additional information, please visit www.abiomed.com.

About Johnson & Johnson MedTech

At Johnson & Johnson MedTech, we unleash diverse healthcare expertise, purposeful technology, and a passion for people to transform the future of medical intervention and empower everyone to live their best life possible. For more than a century, we have driven breakthrough scientific innovation to address unmet needs and reimagine health. In surgery, orthopedics, vision, and interventional solutions, we continue to help save lives and create a future where healthcare solutions are smarter, less invasive, and more personalized. For more information, visit https://thenext.jnjmedtech.com/.