Does the minimally invasive nature of the hybrid procedure reduce the risk of surgery-related complications and death? Will the new hybrid technique result in less scarring ? Does less bleeding reduce the need for blood transfusions?
Fifty-eight-year-old Roberta Ogden has a long history of heart problems. The mother of three and grandmother of six underwent an angioplasty after suffering a heart attack at age 45, and went on to have quadruple coronary bypass surgery the following year.
In 2002, three years after the New Jersey native moved to Newport, N.C., a local cardiologist placed four cardiac stents to alleviate her increasingly labored breathing.
But within five years, her problems had returned with even greater severity…
Ogden initially saw Peter K. Smith, MD, Duke’s chief of cardiovascular and thoracic surgery, who reviewed images recently taken of her heart at the other hospitals. The images revealed recurrent blockages in several coronary arteries, as well as mitral regurgitation, or leakage of the mitral valve…
On September 4, 2007, Ogden became one of the first people in the Southeast to undergo a revolutionary minimally invasive cardiac surgery known as a hybrid procedure — best described as part angioplasty and part valve surgery…
Glower says his team looked at several options for Ogden: doing nothing — which would have put her at even greater risk; treating her with medications; getting her on the heart transplant list; and performing a second open-heart surgery to repair her mitral valve….
Ogden first went to Duke’s catheterization lab, where Lawrence Crawford, MD, placed a small catheter in her groin, through which he performed an angioplasty and placed two drug-eluting stents — one to replace one of Ogden’s existing stents, plus a new one — leaving her with five stents total.
Ogden was then immediately moved to an operating room, where Glower made a two-inch incision under her breast and replaced her mitral valve with a heart valve made from cow tissue in another minimally invasive surgery known as a minithoracotomy, port-access, or keyhole procedure.
The back-to-back nature of the two-part procedure prevents most patients from having to undergo open bypass surgery, which involves cutting through bone, Glower explains.
The fourth U.S. medical institution to ever perform the port-access procedure, Duke Heart Center now performs the world’s second-highest volume of the surgery, Glower says, adding that because both components of the hybrid procedure are still relatively new, it is not yet widely available.
Dancing to Her Heart’s ContentOgden’s surgery went so well that she was able to go home only five days later. And two weeks post-surgery, she was given the okay to drive — something that open-heart surgery patients typically must wait six weeks to do…
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