A Perfusionist is a specialized Allied Health Services Professional, known as a Clinical Perfusionist or Cardio Vascular Perfusionist who uses the heart-lung machine and temporarily replaces the function of Heart and Lungs i.e. patient’s circulatory and respiratory function during cardiac surgery and other surgeries that require cardiopulmonary bypass to manage the patient’s physiological and metabolic demands.
The Clinical Perfusionist is a highly trained member of the cardiothoracic surgical team which consists of Cardiac Surgeons, Anaesthesiologists, Physician assistants and Nurses. The Clinical Perfusionists are solely responsible for the management of the physiological and metabolic demands of the cardiac surgical patients so that cardiac surgeon may operate on a still, unbeating heart. This is accomplish through the utilization of heart-lung machine as well as its associated components an oxygenator, filters, reservoirs and tubing. Other responsibilities of Clinical Perfusionists include autologus blood collection and processing, implementation and management of the intra-aortic balloon pump, adult and infant extracorporeal membrane oxygenation(ECMO) as well as monitoring of blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate, anticoagulation, electrolytes, acid-base and blood-gas composition. In many tertiary hospitals, Clinical Perfusionists are also key personnel in placing and managing patients on ventricular assist devices as bridge to recovery or heart transplantation and supporting patients receiving lung or liver transplants. In some hospitals Clinical Perfusionists can be involved in procurement of cardiothoracic donor organs for transplantation.
One of the most important role of Clinical Perfusionist is to keep a person alive during serious procedures such as open heart surgery. When an operation needs to be performed that involves stoppage of patient’s heart or lungs, something has to be keep blood circulating and oxygen flowing to vital organs such as the brain, kidney, liver and intestines. That something is one of several different kinds of heart-lung machines coupled with the person who knows how to run it.
In tertiary hospitals, Clinical Perfusionists may also play key roles in ventricular assist devices, extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), and supporting heart or lung transplants.
In operating rooms around the world dedicated surgeons perform skillful feats that save lives but they can’t do it alone. There is a whole team of people in the operating room, each with a critical role to play in seeing patients through an operation. One of the most important role in this team is the Clinical Perfusionist-the person who knows how to operate the machines that keep a patient alive during during serious procedure open heart surgery. The Clinical Perfusionists are also operate machine that conserve blood and blood products. Besides the operation of the machinery itself, the Clinical Perfusionist also has the critical role of keeping the surgical team and anaesthesiologists informed about the patients circulatory status. If the patient’s circulation becomes compromised during the procedure, the surgeon will direct the Clinical Perfusionist to take corrective measures and administer any needed medicines or blood products through the heart-lung machine.
Without the critical knowledge and skills of Clinical Perfusionists, many vital medical procedures simply wouldn’t be possible.
