Hello and welcome to HCM, madame. I carefully read your query. If you are referring to a left ventricular assist device (LVAD), they are usually used as a bridge to heart transplant. I am not sure how this works in your country, but I am quite confident that an 88-year old is not a candidate for transplant and, I am afraid, does not pass in the heart transplant committee. However, there are other precautions that can be undertaken in cases of congestive heart failure with low ejection fraction. It would be helpful for me, if you had provided the ejection fraction of the left ventricle, assessed with an echocardiogram. Nevertheless, the therapy should be strict and adhered to. Besides other drugs, a good outcome accompanies the addition of an angiotensinogen converting enzyme inhibitor (ACE-I) or an angiotensinogen II receptor blocker (ARB), a potassium-sparing diuretic (spironolactone) and a loop diuretic (furosemide), to both oppose the compensatory mechanism which, when acting longer than needed, are dangerous to the organism, and, also to reduce the heart workload. Besides this, salt should be totally withheld from his diet, because it is estimated that 1 g of salt retains 10 g of water. Also, you can discuss with his cardiologist about the possibility of implanting an ICD (implanted cardioverter-defibrillator, to automatically convert the potentially life-threatening ventricular arrhythmias, should they happen, which have a high predilection in the damaged heart muscle) and of a CRT (cardiac resynchronization therapy, basically a biventricular pacemaker, which helps both ventricles to contract closer in time). I hope this helps and answers your questions. Take care. Regards, Dr. Meriton