Posted by Linden La Viano on October 22, 2002 at 20:27:41:
For those of you who suffer from chronic atrial fibrillation, atrial flutter, tachycardia, and other heart arrhythmia's and are considering the MAZE procedure, please take the time to research what the Cleveland Clinic has to offer in the way of radio frequency ablation. Admittedly, the MAZE is an effective cure for many A-fib sufferers and I wouldn’t hesitate if this was the only means to correct heart arrhythmia, but Dr. Natale of the Cleveland Clinic has been very innovative in using ablations to correct A-fib and has an 80% success rate on the first ablation and brings this percentage up to 95% if a second ablation is warranted. Unlike some, he does not pick and choose his patients in order to raise this percentage. His aim is to have the patient leave without a pacemaker and to lead a normal life without the need for drugs. The MAZE procedure does have an amazing success ratio and this also is performed at the Cleveland Clinic, however, this procedure is quite invasive and requires a lengthy hospital stay. The ablation, on the other hand, requires the insertion of catheters in veins and is much safer than say an angioplasty or angiogram which involves insertion of catheters in arteries. Also, your hospital stay is just overnight and the patient is released in the afternoon. It is recommended that the patient not put any undue strain on the groin area for a few days so as not to cause leakage in the areas where the catheters were inserted.
I had been diagnosed with A-fib and tachycardia which would trigger atrial flutter and had been advised by cardiologists that an ablation was impractical for me since I had the other arrhythmia's. Perhaps part of this warning was due to the fact that the insurance company that covered me did not have a cardiac electrophysiologist in its system. In any case, I switched health insurers and had an ablation in January 2001. Although the procedure helped immensely, I still had to take medicine to keep me in normal sinus rhythm and the reason was that I had atypical atrial flutter which is not fully understood and much harder to correct than normal atrial flutter. Another reason was that the cardiac electrophysiologist that I was using, and like many others in the states today, could only ablate the right atrium. Dr. Natale traveled to various countries and has learned how to enter into the left atrium and ablate the pulmonary veins where a study in France showed that 94% of the irregular foci originate. He then ablates the left atrium and right atrium if needed. He performed an ablation on me on August 14th of this year and I am 100% pleased with the results. Within one week I resumed all normal activities with no indication of any problems. The Cleveland Clinic does say that some irregular heart rhythms are to be expected and are normal for up to eight weeks after the procedure because it takes time for the heart to heal.
The number for the Cleveland Clinic is (800) 223-2273. The extension for Dr. Natale is 44293. You can also look them up at www.clevelandclinic.org. The Cleveland Clinic is rated as the number one heart hospital in the United States and I recommend it highly.
Linden La Viano
- Re: Radio Frequency Ablation Ed Wehan 21:32:33 10/22/2002 (2)
- Re: Radio Frequency Ablation Linden La Viano 16:59:33 10/26/2002 (1)
- Re: Radio Frequency Ablation Roxann Cline 17:40:04 1/04/2004 (0)