Dang The Uyen, from the Hue Central Hospital, said the patient can be discharged from the hospital in the next few weeks.

On June 6, for the first time in Vietnam, a crew of doctors of the Hue Central Hospital, with the assistance of experts from the Saint Vincent Hospital (Australia), conducted the artificial heart transplant for fisherman Hoang Quoc Bien. The surgery lasted five hours.

Prof. Dr. Bui Duc Phu, director of the Hue Central Hospital, said about 50 people participated in the operation. Technically, Prof. Phu said an artificial device is mounted on the patient’s heart to support the function of part of the heart (left ventricle or right ventricle) that is weakened. The device has power supplied from the outside.

According to Prof. Phu, after the transplant, the patient must comply with the regime for cardiovascular disease like those with artificial heart valves. After the surgery, the patient can work almost normally. Some people have lived with an artificial heart for seven years.

Regarding the cost of the transplant, Prof. Phu said: "We have not calculated the cost for an artificial heart transplant. However, initial estimates show that the cost is very high.”

As the first surgery of its kind, the operation for fisherman Bien is free.

Currently in the U.S. there are thousands of artificial heart transplant operations each year. Japan is the leading country in using this technique in Asia with nearly 200 cases a year. In Southeast Asia, this technique is very limited, with 12 cases in Singapore and four cases in Malaysia last year.