The staff is not missing a beat when it comes to safety in the Electrophysiology Lab (EP) of the Blessing Heart & Vascular Center. Dr. John Hammock and his team recently performed their first cardiac ablation with no fluoroscopy.
What does that mean? The patient and care team were exposed to no radiation during the two hour procedure.
Cardiac ablation blocks incorrect electrical signals within the heart which create abnormal heart rhythms. Catheters – thin, flexible tubes - are threaded through blood vessels to the heart to perform ablation and are frequently moved during the procedure. Fluoroscopy, a continuous X-ray image, much like a movie, has been the standard imaging method used to track the catheters inside the heart during ablation. Patients and staff spend from two-to-six-hours in the EP Lab during an ablation.
“We can do this now without radiation,” said Dr. Hammock. “Now we use intra-cardiac echocardiography that produces images with sound waves instead of radiation, and sophisticated EP mapping software.”
Dr. Hammock is a board certified invasive cardiologist and cardiac electrophysiologist with Blessing Physician Services.
“In addition to eliminating radiation exposure to my patients, no radiation means my team and I no longer need to wear lead vests during our procedures, reducing our lower back pain over the hours we spend in the EP Lab,” he said.
Dr. Hammock and his team perfected their use of intra-cardiac echocardiography and EP mapping software during practice sessions at Blessing. Their final step was a visit to South Carolina’s largest hospital, 995-bed Greenville Memorial Hospital and its Heart & Vascular Institute, to observe an ablation without fluoroscopy.
“We realized then that we were ready to do this at Blessing,” stated Dr. Hammock.
There are places within the heart that can be challenging to visualize without the use of fluoroscopy. Even in those cases, Dr. Hammock and his team are working to limit radiation exposure to five minutes or less.
Click for more information on the care available at the Blessing Heart & Vascular Center.