The Catalyst Issue 9 | Winter 2011 | Page 7

artery disease, or congenital heart defects. “Most patients with heart failure don’t need a heart transplant,” says W. Roy Smythe, MD, chairman of the Department of Surgery at Scott & White Healthcare, and the Glen E. and Rita K. Roney Endowed Chair in Surgery. “Basically patients with more advanced heart failure are served in multiple ways by the efforts to put together a heart transplant program.” Creating a heart transplant program was one of Dr. Smythe’s goals when he arrived at Scott & White in 2004. Planning began in earnest in 2008 with a feasibility study to determine whether Central Texas had a need for a heart transplant center. The study confirmed this need. “In 2008, if our program had been up and running, we would have done more than 20 heart transplants, which automatically makes us a medium-sized A patient undergoes a minimally invasive procedure in the heart catheterization lab. www.sw.org | Winter 11 THE CATALYST 7