ONE HEART AFTER ANOTHER
n the late afternoon - I had just sat down for the first time that day to have a bite to eat - the intensive care unit paged me. The artificial heart patient was still bleeding. My colleagues were unsure if it was due to a clotting problem or a surgical issue. If it was the latter, I would have to operate again. Disrupted clotting can be tackled with a unit of stored blood or an anti-coagulant. At the same time an assistant doctor called to tell me the relatives of the patient with the implanted heart were waiting for me, distraught. There were five of them, and the patient's very pregnant wife was at the end of her tether. She wanted to know how
