Our work
The UK’s first heart transplant was carried out at Harefield Hospital in 1980 and the first robotic-assisted heart operation was conducted at Royal Brompton. We were the first centre in the UK to start trials of lung volume reduction surgery. Today, we are only one of three centres in the UK trialing 'artificial hearts' (left ventricular assist devices or LVADs).
Our expertise
- Mitral valve repair and replacement, including simple procedures and complex repairs
- Aortic valve procedures including the Ross operation, aortic valve-preserving root replacement homografts, re-operative aortic surgery and a host of artificial valve substitutes
- International leadership in airway resections and complex reconstructions
- Interventional endoscopic treatment of airway obstruction
- Minimally invasive (“keyhole”) heart surgery, including being the first cardiothoracic unit in the country to be performing robotic surgery
- Beating heart (“off-pump“) heart surgery
- Complex surgery for arrhythmia
- Surgical intervention to treat heart failure, including pioneering work in fitting Left Ventricular Assist Devices (LVADs) or ‘artificial hearts’
- Extensive experience in Pectus surgery, including minimally invasive repair
- Surgical intervention in emphysema cases
- Surgical treatment for lung, chest and oesophageal cancers and non-malignant thoracic surgery
- Lung volume reduction surgery
- Complex surgery for locally advanced thoracic malignancies (eg Grunenwald procedure for Pancoast tumours)
- Centre of excellence for pulmonary metastasectomy (we are the designated provider of Thoracic Sarcoma Surgery Services for Greater London )
- Pioneering work in cryosurgery, where by freezing tumours we can operate on patients where intervention would otherwise be difficult
