Newstrack: Heart and Vascular Institute offers new procedure, recruits specialist

Background

In April 2015, specialists from UnityPoint Health-St. Luke's Hospital and Physician's Clinic of Iowa partnered to provide better cardiac care through the Heart and Vascular Institute.

The goal of the institute was to offer a better patient experience, better coordinated care, reduced costs, clinical trials and research and new technology to aid in cardiovascular care.

The team — made up of physicians and cardiovascular surgeons — has a wide range of specialties, including cardiac and vascular surgery, cardiovascular imaging, advanced heart failure treatment, heart disease prevention and coronary and vascular therapeutics.

What's happened since

In the year and a half since the Heart and Vascular Institute was created, it has started offering several new procedures, recruited a congestive heart failure specialist and started work on developing a clinical research program.

'We're very excited about the progress so far,' said Dr. Todd Langager, the medical director of UnityPoint Health-Cedar Rapids Heart and Vascular Institute.

Langager pointed to a new procedure St. Luke's started offering this fall — transcatheter aortic valve replacement.

TAVR is a less invasive option for patients that are too high-risk or sick for open-heart surgery. Valves are inserted via a catheter through the femoral artery, without requiring open-heart surgery. This minimally invasive surgical procedure repairs the damaged valve by placing a replacement valve into the aortic valve.

'We've performed two procedures that have gone very well and have several more scheduled for this year,' he said. 'I'd imagine we'll do 30 to 40 next year, and it will double the year after that.'

Langager said that before the hospital offered the procedure, patients would have to go to the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics or even the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

The TAVR procedure, along with new technology to repair varicose veins — VenaSeal — and a new procedure aimed at preventing blood clots from developing — Watchman — are allowing patients to receive care locally, have quality outcomes and spend less on health care, he said.

'Ultimately that's what patients want,' he said.

The institute also is in the process of developing a clinical research program, Langager said, which would allow patients to participate in procedures and have access to prescription drugs before U.S. Federal Drug Administration approval. And starting in January, Dr. Rob Oren, board certified in Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology, will begin practicing at St. Luke's.