Enables Doctors to Diagnose and Treat Heart Disease
(HENDERSON, NV, August 18, 2008) – St. Rose Dominican Hospitals – San Martín Campus recently added the new Volcano Intravascular Ultrasound (IVUS) system to its already extensive supply of advanced cardiology equipment. The IVUS system is considered the gold standard in the next generation of technologies for treating heart disease. It surpasses traditional angiogram procedures which offer only black and white images of heart vessels.
“The St. Rose mission involves offering technological advancements to improve healthcare offerings in the community,” said Rod Davis, president of St. Rose Dominican Hospitals. “The IVUS system, along with our two award-winning Open Heart Surgery Centers, provides the tools that enable doctors to better diagnose and treat patients with coronary heart disease.”
Dr. Herb Cordero, an interventional cardiologist who performs the procedure at St. Rose Dominican Hospitals, says the procedure is similar to a traditional angiogram except that the IVUS is used rather than a camera. According to Cordero, “We still need a traditional angiogram that shows us shadows of the heart vessels that represent plaque build up that may be narrowing or obstructing an artery, but IVUS’s technology goes a step further and produces highly-detailed images of the arteries from the inside out. This enables us to get accurate measurements of the artery size and plaque size/volume. At St. Rose, the IVUS is used as part of a three-part integrated platform with two other diagnostic tools – Fractional Flow Reserve (FFR) and Virtual Histology. The benefit of the IVUS is that with the more detailed images, we can implant stents more accurately thereby improving the long-term blood flow through the artery.”
