CHI - KentuckyOne Health (Central-Eastern)

"This subset of heart disorders is very complex and requires a collaborative team approach to address effectively," said Nezar Falluji, MD, MPH, FACC, FSCAI, board-certifi ed interventional cardiologist with KentuckyOne Health Cardiology Associates–Lexington. "At KentuckyOne Health, we offer a comprehensive, multidisciplinary approach. We combine the skills of interventional cardiologists, who specialize in structural heart disease, with those of cardiovascular surgeons to provide the best evidence-based pharmacologic, minimally invasive and surgical intervention care." A Minimally Invasive Approach to Treating AVS If you are dealing with aortic valve stenosis (AVS), you know how exhausting the condition can be. For patients with severe AVS who are not ideal candidates for surgical replacement, implanting a prosthetic aortic valve using a minimally invasive approach saves lives and improves quality of life. This approach is known as transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR). At Saint Joseph Hospital and Jewish Hospital, both part of KentuckyOne Health, physicians use a catheter to place the replacement valve within the old, damaged valve, almost like a stent. The new valve takes over, and normal blood fl ow is restored. At KentuckyOne Health, TAVR is performed under conscious sedation, which improves patients' recoveries and decreases hospital length of stay. "The quality of life prior to aortic valve replacement is poor, and patients with aortic valve stenosis can't do any type of activity that requires exertion — climbing the stairs, walking more than a block or doing things they want to do become impossible," said Michael Flaherty, MD, PhD, board-certifi ed interventional cardiologist, associate professor of medicine and physiology at the University of Louisville and director of adult structural heart disease at Jewish Hospital."Fixing the valve not only improves patients' quality of life, but is lifesaving. All those limitations are gone. When we perform the replacement with a catheter and use conscious sedation, patients are up and walking around the day of the procedure and go home the next day." Fixing Blood Flow Without Surgery Patients with mitral valve regurgitation also face exhaustion, extreme fatigue and shortness of breath. If you have severe leakage but are not a candidate for surgery, the MitraClip system can help. Available at Saint Joseph Hospital and Jewish Hospital, this system uses a nonsurgical puncture and a catheter to place a clip on the mitral valve. MitraClip allows the valve to close more completely, reducing the backfl ow of blood. To learn more about cardiac care at KentuckyOne Health, visit KentuckyOneHealth.org/Heart. Michael Flaherty, MD, PhD Nezar Falluji, MD, MPH, FACC, FSCAI KentuckyOne Health provides advanced treatments for structural heart diseases. ONE HEALTH | Winter 2017 9

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