Heart Surgery 

Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospital is the largest stand alone cardiac unit in the country and offers a great width of expertise and specialist skills in heart surgery for our patients.

There are eleven cardiac surgeons employed at the Trust and the following are the three main domains of specialism:-

Coronary Artery Surgery

The most common heart operation is Coronary Artery Bypass Grafts (CABG).   The Trust has the largest experience in the country of “off pump” or beating heart CABG.   This is a technique to carry out the grafting without stopping the heart.   Not only are there many benefits to the patient but also to the hospital in terms of resource usage.   Due to this our hospital is not only the country’s leading trainer of junior doctors in this practice but we also offer training to experienced Cardiac Surgical Consultants.

Aortic Surgery

The Trust has a team of aortic surgeons who specialise in this field.   They operate on aortic aneurysms in the chest and down to the abdomen.    In addition to this they also offer a 24 hours 7 days a week cover for Aortic emergencies, including dissections, transections and ruptured aneurysms.   The hospital is the first cardiac unit in the country to have a purpose built hybrid theatre that allows our team to do aortic stenting and even combined stent and open procedures.   The team also monitor and follow up patients with pre-morbid aortic pathology.

Mitral repair

The Trust has a team of surgeons who offer complex Mitral repair surgery along with tricuspid repairs.   This can involve replacement of heart strings or chordae as well as leaflet transpositions and resections.   This team also has a growing practice in atrial fibrillation surgery.   They offer radio frequency and other modality ablation to convert atrial dysrhythmias back into the regular rhythm.

The Trust has five recently built or refurbished dedicated theatres for cardiac surgery to be undertaken at the Trust.   Following surgery the patients are then transferred into one of the largest critical care areas in Europe to receive first class post operative care.

All cardiac surgery is closely audited and the Trust cardiac surgical audit of activity and outcome is heralded as the leading standard that the rest of the country is striving to achieve.   The outcomes and surgeon specific performance data is available for the public to see on the Clinical Outcomes page of our website

We have a keen interest in training the next generation of heart surgeons and regularly run wet-lab training for local and national trainees to hone their surgical skills.   Our trainees not only have a high pass rate at the Trust Exit Exam but are often the top scoring candidates.  

 

To find out more about Working for the Trust

For more details on the Trust's Consultant Cardiac Surgeons