The University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center has applied a 3-D computer navigation system from Medtronic to its pediatric clientele undergoing radiofrequency catheter ablation of cardiac arrhythmias, and has received positive results:
A University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center team today is reporting high levels of success, and lowered risk and radiation dose, from a new approach to treating children with rapid heartbeats and other heart rhythm conditions.
In a presentation at the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions meeting, members of the Michigan Congenital Heart Center will present new data from a study of a treatment called RF catheter ablation in children using a three-dimensional computer assisted navigation system.
They show that by adding the 3-D navigation system to a conventional X-ray based method to visualize electrophysiological catheters inside the heart, they were able to successfully treat 99.1 percent of 113 patients included in the study.
While the procedural success rate was very high, the most significant finding was that the patients who were treated using the 3-D computer navigation system were spared almost half the radiation dose received by 108 comparable patients treated immediately before the new system was available.
The University of Michigan press release…
As of this morning, the LocaLisa product page at Medtronic was down. But Google cache is still available.