The life of a perfusionist: between sacrifices and professional satisfactions

What is the confusion between perfusionist and percussionist?

The reason why I’m asking you this question is because lots of people don’t know about this kind of job. Some of them in Italy, confuse the word perfusionist with percussionist because the words are very similar to each other. But I’m not a musician. I am chief technician of perfusion in the cardiac surgery of Rome Hospital.
The perfusionist is a highly trained member of the cardiothoracic surgical team which consists of cardiac surgeons, anesthesiologists, physician assistants, surgical technologists, and nurses. A perfusionist, is a specialized healthcare professional who uses the heart-lung machine during cardiac surgery to manage the patient's physiological status and keep the patient alive when the heart is stopped. The open heart surgery, in fact, requires that the heart to be stopped and so my job is to ensure blood circulation and oxygenation through the heart-lung machine. The perfusionist's main responsibility is to manage the metabolic needs of the cardiac surgical patient which has a great effect on his systemic condition. Other responsibilities include autologous blood collection and monitoring of anticoagulation, electrolyte, acid-base balance and blood-gas composition. I have the patient's life in my hands and even a little mistake can be fatal. In some hospitals, perfusionists are also key personnel in placing and managing patients on long-term cardiac assistance as bridge to heart transplantation and supporting patients receiving lung or liver transplants.

Challenges and sacrifices of the job

At the beginning my job required a long training and it still needs to be continuously updated. To achieve my goals I had to make many sacrifices like to get up early in the morning, be called in emergency even at night, studying every day. It’s a very hard job with great responsibility, but I prefer this kind of work to a desk job
Sometimes I had to overshadow the needs of my family. When my son said his first "daddy" I was working in the operating room, and the same happened when he walked for the first time or when my family needed me. But there is a great satisfaction when the efforts of surgical teams save the patient's life. I also had the opportunity to travel a lot for business and meet new people, I often held conferences in the most beautiful places in the world like New Orleans, Paris, Rome, Sardinia, eating in the finest restaurants.I would like to work in research, because it fascinates me so much. During my studies I developed a new technique for monitoring coagulation in cardiac surgery and last year I went in the U.S. to propose my method to a company. I think I will return to the U.S. this year to close the deal Moreover I would rather work in USA than in Italy because for Americans substance is more important than appearance and those who deserve have more chances to make a career.

My next goal is to sell my license for a medical device that I invented and patented. That’s all.