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St Vincent's Hospital commences screening patients for C-Pulse TM Trial

13 / 04 / 2006

Key points:
- Sunshine Heart, Inc. receives ethics approval to commence its C-PulseT clinical trial program at St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney, NSW
- Sunshine Heart, Inc. clinical trial program involves up to 10 patients at centres in Melbourne, Sydney and New Zealand

Sunshine Heart, Inc. (ASX: SHC) announced today that it has received ethics approval to commence its C-PulseT Pilot Clinical Trial at St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney.

St Vincent's Hospital is now actively screening for heart failure patients to participate in this CPulseT clinical trial following permission from its Human Research Ethics Committee.

Dr. Christopher Hayward, investigator and Cardiologist said, "St Vincent''s Hospital is excited to be part of this C-PulseTTrial. As Australia''s first heart/lung transplant unit, St Vincent''s has a long tradition of trialing innovative technologies."

The C-PulseT device improves the heart function of patients with heart failure by increasing blood supply to the heart muscle and reducing the heart's pumping work. It is uniquely designed as a non-blood contacting heart-assist device, reducing the risk of clotting and bleeding complications as well as making it safe to turn the device on and off.

Victor Windeyer, Chief Operating Officer at Sunshine Heart said, "The commencement of patient screening at St Vincent's Hospital increases the number of centres participating in the pilot trial to accelerate the accrual of data to support our US regulatory applications."

The C-PulseT Pilot Trial is a multi-centre trial involving up to ten patients being conducted at Auckland City Hospital, The Alfred Hospital, Southern Health Monash Medical Centre and St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney. All the trial sites are now actively screening patients for inclusion in the trial.