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In a first, heart that’s in distress will e-mail the doctor for help

Article taken from The Saginaw News 8/16/06
Jill Armentrout

Mary E. Littlejohn’s heart will “talk” to her doctor after he completes surgery today at Covenant Medical Center Cooper in Saginaw.

The Bridgeport Township resident was to become the first patient at Covenant and in this part of the country to receive an implantable cardioverter defibrillator with the ability to regularly transmit to her doctor information about her heart’s health.

Implanted in the chest, the device works to resynchronize the beating heart to correct abnormal rhythms common in patients such as Littlejohn who have congestive heart failure.

Electric leads stimulate the heart muscle to synchronize contractions of the heart’s ventricles or lower chambers. That helps the heart push blood through the body better.

The implant, which Berlin-based Biotronik makes, offers the new “home monitoring” via a small antenna that sends medical and technical information to a mobile receiver the patient can carry. The receiver works like a cell telephone that forwards the data to a secure Web site to which the patient’s doctor has access.

Dr. Asim Yunus, a cardiologist and director of electrophysiology at Michigan Cardiovascular Institute in Saginaw and at Covenant, is the first doctor in the eastern United States to use the newly approved technology, Biotronik officials said.

“This isn’t new surgery or a new device, but it is a phenomenal quantum leap in how we manage patients after the fact through long-term evaluation at home,” Yunus said.

“If a patient has no symptoms but begins to have irregular rhythms, the device detects it and sends a message. It can recognize signs leading to more dangerous things.”

Littlejohn, 71, said she has had symptoms of heart failure – shortness of breath and fatigue – since January. Her doctor admitted her to the hospital last week, when Yunus determined she had damage to her left ventricle that put her at risk for a deadly arrhythmia.

“I had a ‘silent’ heart attack years ago, but I never had any problems until lately,” she said.
A previous heart attack can damage the muscle and lead to heart failure.

The home monitoring technology works to detect changes in heart rhythm long before the device has to perform an electrical “shock” to correct a problem, Yunus said. Any sudden change in rhythm sends an immediate e-mail or fax to the doctor.

“This offers vastly enhanced follow up, patient safety and better care,” he said.

MCVI physicians treat nearly 3,000 heart failure patients. Yunus said they will convert all standard implantable cardioverter defibrillators in those patients to ones with the monitoring capability in the next five to 10 years.

“There is nothing in the field of electrophysiology offered today that you can’t get here in Saginaw,” he said.

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