MDNews - Greater Boston

kinds of conditions will have access to evaluation and treatment through a multidisciplinary service model at Southcoast. Among Southcoast's Structural Heart Program offerings are transcatheter therapies and minimally invasive techniques, which provide alternatives to traditional open heart surgery. The Structural Heart Program team is made up of cardiologists, cardiac surgeons and support staff. The team works together with referring physicians to form specialized treatment plans for each patient. "We'll be able to offer minimally invasive therapies rather than open surgical interventions because our team will be able to evaluate patients collectively and decide the best option for each patient," Dr. Saltzman says. "We are bringing together specialists from different areas to help in the assessment of patients so we can come together to discuss each patient in depth and offer the best care." Among the most important investments Southcoast will be making to support the Structural Heart Program is the development of a hybrid operating room at Charlton Memorial Hospital in Fall River. Dr. Saltzman says this will be a modern OR equipped with all the standard bells and whistles along with devices needed to enable minimally invasive surgery. "This investment will greatly benefit the structural heart program, the cardiovascular surgeons and other programs available at Charlton Memorial," Dr. Saltzman says. Patients in the South Coast region no longer need to travel hours to receive the care they need. They will now have local access to a dedicated Structural Heart Program that provides a strong continuum of care from start to finish, complete with post-treatment care. "We are working to get the word out," Dr. Saltzman says. "We want patients to know we are here for them. We are getting out into the communities, speaking to physicians, nurses and the general public, so everyone knows this option exists and what we can offer." Right now, Southcoast's Structural Heart Program is focusing on the development of a transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) program. Dr. Saltzman says this is a minimally invasive approach that uses catheters to replace tight (stenotic) aortic valves. Once replaced, patients will see symptom improvements and have significantly prolonged lives. TAVR is important because many people dealing with stenotic aortic valves are elderly and can be high-risk surgical candidates because of other medical conditions. "Many of these kinds of patients would previously not receive therapy because the risks involved with cardiovascular surgery were too high," Dr. Saltzman says. "Now these kinds of minimally invasive procedures offer new alternatives. We're seeing great results from the TAVR trials. There is a lot of excitement about this new procedure, and we continue to develop programs such as this to provide the very best care to all of our patients." For more information about the Southcoast Structural Heart Program, please visit www.southcoast.org/heart/ structural.html. ■ Cardiologist adam J. saltzman, Md, has joined southcoast to lead the new structural heart Program, the only program of its kind in the region and one of only a handful of dedicated structural heart programs in all of new england. mdnewS.com ■ MD News Greater Boston | 13

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