Successful Perioperative Management of a Patient with the Left Ventricular Assist Device for Brain Tumor Resection: Case Report and Review of the Literature

Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Heart failure is the leading cause of death in the United States. Our increasingly aged population will contribute to an increased incidence and prevalence of heart failure, thereby augmenting the need formechanical circulatory devices. Here we present the first successful resection of a brain tumor in a left ventricular device- (LVAD-) dependent patient with increased intracranial pressure and address pertinent perioperative anesthetic considerations and management. 1. Background Heart failure continues to be the leading cause of death in United States. It is estimated to affect>5 million Americans and 550,000 new cases are diagnosed annually [1]. Although cardiac transplantation carries an excellent result for the treatment of end-stage heart failure, this option is severely limited by the number of available donor hearts. Ventricular assist devices (LAD; left (L) and (R) right) were initially developed to temporarily support the failing heart as a bridg