Monterey, CA New Heart Treatments Being Developed For The Frail Elderly

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There have been a number of recent press articles regarding the efficacy of having heart surgery done with "robots" which are machines with surgical tools where a surgeon controls the actions via a screen and keyboard.  Although the jury is still out on that technology, there is recent evidence that a surgeon's knife for some procedures may soon become a thing of the past.  Everything from repairing heart valves, irregular heartbeats and repairing heart defects are now being done without invasive open heart surgery.  Now doctors are testing whether they can even treat high blood pressure using catheters, hollow tubes which allow doctors to whittle away and reshape heart tissue through small holes in blood vessels.  "This is the replacement for the surgeon's knife.  Instead of opening the chest, we're able to put catheters in through the leg, sometimes through the arm," Dr. Spencer King from the Vascular Institute, who is also the former President of the American College of Cardiology, told a reporter.  This allows patients to go home after a day or two and insurance companies like it because it's a much cheaper option than open heart surgery.  One upside is that these procedures are much safer for seniors.  Many surgeons won't even do this type of surgery on the very elderly for fear the procedure itself could kill them.  "You can do these on 90-year old patients," said Dr. King.  Both of our Platinum sponsors, Alliance Home Health and Family inHome Caregiving see these terrible situations every day where clients are in a pickle because their age makes treatment options limited.  What a wonderful breakthrough in technology which will not only help seniors but will save on medical costs.