Catholic Health’s St. Francis Hospital & Heart Center® recently became the first Long Island hospital to use the Aveir Leadless Pacemaker to treat a patient with cardiac arrhythmia.
Performed by St. Francis Cardiac Electrophysiologist Vinni Jayam, MD, the pacemaker was placed in the patient, a 44-year Long Island man, in about 30 minutes. Unlike traditional pacemakers, the leadless unit allows doctors to implant the device through a minimally invasive procedure.
Jayam placed the device on the lower right chamber of the patient’s heart via a catheter-based procedure, avoiding a surgical incision in the chest that is common with a traditional transvenous pacemaker. An added patient benefit is that the pacemaker’s battery can last more than 20 years, reducing the number of times a procedure needs to be performed.
“The leadless pacemaker works like a traditional pacemaker to regulate the heart,” Dr. Jayam said. “The major benefit and difference of this technology is that it can be retrievable and upgradable to a dual-chamber leadless system.”
This Aveir pacemaker technology is the first of its kind with such an upgradable feature.
“Treating patients with technology such as a leadless pacemaker is another example of the cutting-edge cardiac care St. Francis provides,” said St. Francis Hospital & Heart Center’s Arrhythmia & Pacemaker Center Director Joseph Levine. “We remain committed to continue exploring new options to help those in need achieve an improved quality of life.
The St. Francis patient was part of the Leadless IDE (Investigative Device Exemption) clinical study designed to assess the new device in patients with abnormal heart rhythms. The worldwide study enrolled 200 patients to collect data that would be submitted for regulatory approvals.
To learn more about the cardiac care services offered by Catholic Health’s St. Francis Heart Center, visit chsli.org or call (866) MY-LI-DOC.
