Bay Area Heart Institute Helps Pioneer New Microwave Surgery to Correct Common Heart Disease; Procedure Offers New Hope for Two Million Atrial Fibrillation Patients.

Business Editors and Health/Medical/High-Tech Writers

SAN RAMON, Calif.--(BW HealthWire)--Dec. 5, 2001

If you are one of about two million Americans with an irregular heartbeat known as atrial fibrillation, the answer may be as familiar as a phone call. Cell phone call, that is. Doctors at San Ramon Regional Medical Center's Bay Area Heart Institute are using microwaves -- the same energy that sends signals to and from cell phones -- in order to restore normal heartbeats in atrial fibrillation patients.

Atrial fibrillation may cause heart palpitations, chest pain, shortness of breath, fatigue, dizziness, faintness, and a five times greater risk of stroke. Recently heart surgeon Murali Dharan, M.D., at San Ramon Regional Medical Center became the first surgeon on the West Coast to perform the new AFx microwave treatment on atrial fibrillation patients.

In addition, Dr. Dharan is the first surgeon on the West Coast to perform the AFx microwave treatment on a beating-heart, called minimally invasive off-pump artery bypass surgery (a procedure performed without stopping the heart and without placing the patient on a heart-lung machine).

"Microwave surgery fills a technology gap that's existed for the approximately two million American atrial fibrillation sufferers," said Dr. Dharan, a cardiothoracic surgeon. "Previously, the focus was on trying to manage their disease. Now, we can offer patients the possibility of a permanent treatment."

San Ramon Regional Medical Center's Director of Cardiology Pramodh Sidhu, M.D., agrees. "One of my patients, a middle-aged man suffering from severe shortness of breath as a result of atrial fibrillation, experienced a successful outcome from the microwave ablation surgery. His exercise capacity improved greatly, and he was able to go off blood thinner medication, which I had prescribed to reduce his risk of stroke," he said.

The new procedure uses a microwave surgery technology developed by Silicon Valley-based AFx inc. and approved by the Food and Drug Administration in May 2001. The technology -- consisting of a hand-held surgeon's "antenna" about the diameter of a lead of pencil -- allows doctors to treat atrial fibrillation without hooking up patients to heart-lung machines. "Avoiding the heart-lung machine reduces the trauma and risk associated with some other heart surgeries," Dr. Dharan explained.

Although the AFx microwave technology was approved only recently for use in the U.S., nearly 1,000 AFx procedures have been performed globally since it was first introduced in Europe in 1999. Many surgeons have reported successful outcomes.

Atrial fibrillation is an uncontrolled beating or quivering of the heart's upper chambers due to a breakdown in the heart's electrical patterns. "By passing the microwave antenna over a heart, the surgeon can kill bad cells that block the heart's normal electrical pathways. Once these electrical pathways are restored, the heart can go back to its normal beating rhythm and the atrial fibrillation goes away," Dr. Dharan said.

Although microwave surgery has been used on a limited basis for more than a decade, Dr. Dharan said, "This may be the first use of microwaves on the heart. Microwaves are viewed as an optimal energy source for certain surgeries because of their controllability, precision, versatility and gentleness to patients. With this new microwave surgery technology, I believe we are on the threshold of a new generation of medical devices that will treat ordinary diseases with greater precision for the surgeon and greater gentleness for the patient," Dr. Dharan said.

San Ramon Regional Medical Center, opened in 1990, is a full-service acute-care hospital with a wide range of inpatient and outpatient healthcare services, including a 24-hour emergency services, intensive and cardiac care, and maternity services. Programs include the Bay Area Heart Institute, Minimally Invasive Surgery, Spine and Joint Program, Women's Cancer Center, Breast Cancer Care, and Outpatient Surgery Center. For more information, visit the hospital Web site: www.sanramonmedctr.com or call 925/275-9200.

San Ramon Regional Medical Center is part of Tenet HealthSystem (NYSE:THC), which through its subsidiaries, owns and operates 114 acute-care hospitals with 28,166 licensed beds and numerous related healthcare services. The company employs approximately 110,000 people serving communities in 17 states and services its hospitals from a Dallas-based operations center. Tenet can be found on the World Wide Web at www.tenethealth.com.