About
Doctor Thasee Pillay was approached by the Federal Drug Administration (FDA) of the US earlier this year, to teach, train and certify US surgeons to carry out the radical procedure.
Pillay, who was born and raised in Dundee, studied and trained in Durban before moving to the UK in 1996. Now based in Denver, Colorado,the 51-year-old will be required to teach 4,000 specialist surgeons how to insert the "Perceval", a suture-less aortic heart valve, into patients with degenerating valves.
With an invitation from the Society of Cardiothoracic Surgeons of SA, the report says Pillay introduced Perceval to local specialists, at Cape Town's ICC, recently.
Perceval, a valve made from an elastic-type metal (Nitinol) and animal (mostly cow) skin, has gained worldwide popularity since its launch, earlier this year. Apart from its clever design, which allows the valve to pump more blood in sync with the body's natural rhythm, surgeons fit the valve by performing keyhole surgery.
Usually surgeons take up to three hours to replace valves via open heart surgery and patients need about seven days in hospital. But fitting Perceval is said to take approximately 90 minutes and patients' hospital stay is reduced to four days, and they are able to return to work within four weeks. After open-heart surgery, patients were usually fit for work after three months.
Pillay said fitting the Perceval was unlike a transplant which the body could reject and lead to possible blood transfusion. "There have been 17,000 implants done worldwide with excellent results."
He is one of only four experts (proctors) around the world who is able to train and certify surgeons for the use of Perceval, which is made by London-based medical device manufacturer LivaNova.
Pillay worked for the National Health Service and was based at Newcastle's Freeman Hospital, where he specialised in heart surgery, heart and lung transplants and mechanical heart surgery. "The FDA approached me as I'm the leading UK surgeon in this technology and I was chosen to teach US surgeons.
"The beauty of this valve is that the nitinol metal, when cold, expands to fill and attach itself to the walls of the heart and keeps in position.
"Perceval was designed in Italy and I was among the group of experts that researched it. It was tested on millions of cycles before we used it on patients."

EDUCATION
FRCS (CTh)
FCS (CTh) University of SA
MB.ChB at University of Natal

INTERESTS
Transcatheter Aortic Valve Implantation
Beating Heart CABG
Mini Access AVR
Mechanical assist devices
Lung transplantation
Robotic CABG
Heart transplantation
TAVI

ORGANIZATIONS
Cardiothoracic Surgery Network
International Society for Minimally Invasive Cardiothoracic Surgery
Society for Cardiothoracic Surgery in Great Britain and Ireland
World Society of Cardio-Thoracic Surgeons