Breaking the new ground: World’s best cardiac catheterization rooms

Herzliya Medical Center, Israel’s leading private hospital, proudly presents its new most advanced heart catheterization rooms in Israel and globally. The best medical personnel and specialists are readily available whenever you need them.

Catheterization – Exact meaning of a familiar word

Catheterization is a common diagnostic procedure used to identify and eliminate the atherosclerosis of coronary arteries or heart vessels, and clear any occlusions, if necessary. In process of catheterization, in addition to continuous X-ray analysis and infusing the contrast agent, a tiny tube (catheter) is administered. The doctor, assisting personnel, and X-ray laboratory technician analyze the images received as blood vessels are checked, and, if an occlusion is found, diagnose the problem and decide between the available treatment options.

Treatment modality

As mentioned before, the catheterization itself is a diagnostic procedure ending with application of different types of treatment, depending on the exact diagnostics, conducted by doctors and their assistants in real time. As a rule, the doctors and the hospital staff personally observe the patient supported with information about his/her health and, just as important, can assess the patient’s health in the future and his/her ability to enjoy a normal life to the extent possible.

Therefore, the individual treatment is selected in each case for each specific patient depending on the several factors including the patient’s age, background diseases, as well as the technology that allows an accurate diagnostics of the problem and recommended type of the treatment.

In real time the personnel conducts the physiological examination of blood flow in the artery (FFR – Fractional Flow Reserve Measurement), which allows, in addition to angiography, to get the physiological index that is used as an auxiliary tool for making qualified decision as to further intervention (stent implantation) or completion of the diagnostic process. As compared to other hospitals, this kind of examination is conducted here frequently, and, as mentioned above, it is aimed at selecting the correct therapy and, if possible, to avoid needless active intervention on vessels.

Conservative treatment

If the narrowing of the blood vessel lumen does not affect the normal blood flow, the conservative treatment may be decided to be the best method of treatment. Conservative treatment can include the treatment which is directed on the reduction of risk factors, such as decrease of blood pressure, decrease of CHOLESTEROL LDL, change of nutrition scheme, physical exercises, etc.

An active treatment for expansion of the lumen of a blood vessel

In case of significant narrowing of the lumen, it is decided to conduct the active treatment during the catheterization. The procedure will involve the disclosure of a blood vessel by using the balloon and stent placement that provides a drug of last generation that allows keeping the blood vessel open.

Diagnostics requiring surgical intervention (heart bypass)

In some cases, the real-time examination reveals the necessity of heart bypass due to serious blockage of one or several blood vessels (advanced case). In these cases, depending on the urgency of the operation, the patient is transferred to the heart and chest surgery department to be carefully attended by one of the leading surgeons in Israel.

If the issue is so common, why is it so important to insist on choosing the right operating room for the catheterization?

In fact, the procedure of catheterization is common and safe, and over the decades a large number of men and women have undergone the procedure being discharged home within a few hours after its completion.

However, various catheterization procedures are considered quite challenging not because of the procedure itself, but due to constant need of roentgenologic observation using X-ray machine that regularly transilluminates the patient’s body, allowing to see the full picture of the blood vessels; administration of contrast material is also needed to allow the doctor and the personnel identifying the blood vessels.

The optimal and continuous observation of the blood vessels is necessary for the successful treatment and prevention of unnecessary complications, such as damage of the blood vessels.

Whereas the heart catheterization is eventually a necessary procedure to preserve the health and includes a well-known problem associated with continuous irradiation, Herzliya Medical Center has introduced the next-generation catheterization rooms built, designed and equipped specially to address on this problem.

These rooms, unprecedented in Israel, use low-radiation X-ray machines (70% less compared to other devices) that enable getting images of the highest quality, allowing the doctor to see the blood vessels clearly.

The new X-ray machine allows taking photos of large body sections simultaneously, therefore the doctors do not need using a large number of radioactive contrast materials, which has been inevitable with the equipment of previous generations.

Special features of hospital equipment

During the catheterization procedure, the doctors use three key accessories, some of which are left in our body. Therefore, it is essential that they should fit the body as much as possible.

Catheter is a flexible hollow tube which is injected into the blood vessels to diagnose and remove their blockage and narrowing
Balloon is injected into a blood vessel and inflated inside the blood vessel for its expansion
Stent is a screen-like cylinder of various sizes, which is injected into the blood vessels and supports blood vessel walls, ensuring that the vessel remains open for blood flow
Herzliya Medical Center catheterization rooms offer the stents of all sizes and types 24/7, so the doctors can choose the most appropriate size of the stent (the size of the stent varies depending on body size). Our patients have the preference right to use a bio-resorptive stent.

While the ordinary stent is made of metal that is left in the body and sometimes in future can lead to the complications that require the additional treatment (formation of a blood clot and rupture of a blood vessel), the bio-resorptive stent is absorbed into blood vessel and prevents presence of foreign material in the treated location.

Stents used by our personnel, including bio-resorptive stents, are the most progressive in the world and always approved for use by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which is the toughest global authority issuing permits for the use of medical equipment and drugs.

Since this is a common procedure, is it so important what doctor conducts it?

Indeed, the procedure is common. However, like in any profession, the experience is decisive, especially in the case of the invasive procedures. All Herzliya Medical Center doctors are the professionals to attend you on individual basis. The hospital experts are the best in Israel and worldwide, and you have the right to choose a doctor – the right you can enjoy only in a private hospital, but not in a public institution. We guarantee that you will be treated by the preferred doctor from the very beginning of the treatment until your complete recovery. We assure that you will be attended by a senior doctor. So you can be confident that you are treated by a doctor with great experience and you are in good hands during the entire treatment.

Safety, control and quality

The catheterization room is a fully equipped new-generation operating room that ensures maximum safety during the treatment (sealing allows to prevent the dissemination of infection to the maximum extent), privacy and quality for the patient that has no equivalent in Israel.

The operating room has been carefully elaborated and designed as to allow the doctor to use the most modern equipment and enable grasping a complete picture of the blood vessels in real time with the images obtained during the previous procedures of the catheterization and/or examinations, conducted in the past, for comparison, in order to support the most adequate decision concerning the treatment.

The treatment is successfully completed: what next?

Herzliya Medical Center professional practice suggests that the doctors try to avoid a cut in the inguinal region wich requires 24-hour hospitalization.

Alternatively, with a cut on the arm, which is performed in about 98% catheterization hospital cases, you can be discharged in a few hours after the treatment completion and quickly return to normal daily activities.

When the catheterization procedure is completed, the patient is transferred to hospitalization department, where he/she receives services at the highest level, customary for our clinical practice. Each patient is given a hotel-like room, food from a chef and caring personnel ready to solve any issues.