Adventist Health Hanford offers a procedure for the ‘world’s tiniest pacemaker’
As medical technology continues to improve, there’s a new pacemaker available to patients that’s out of sight and out of mind. Adventist Health Hanford is the first Central Valley hospital to offer patients the “world’s tiniest pacemaker.” The first procedure was one in May. The average pacemaker is a small device – about the size of a matchbox, It’s placed in the collarbone area to help a patient’s heartbeat at a normal rate and rhythm. However, as medical technology continues to improve, there’s a new pacemaker available to patients that’s out of sight and out of mind. “Now we can place them inside the right side of the heart, and they’re much, much smaller in size,” explained Dr Sukhvinder Bhajal.
Heart of the Problem,
On January 23, 2008 Lindsay Mayor, Ed Murray, got a frantic call from his doctor. "He started yelling into the phone asking me what I was doing and to sit down wherever I was and wait for an ambulance," Murray said. "I told him that I felt fine, I didn't know what he was talking about." The doctor explained that he had just looked at Murray's EKG and found an arrhythmia, or abnormal heart rhythm.
A Heartfelt Prescription
Everyone has felt their heart race at some point in time, but Janice Thompson knew the way her heat began racing in her 20s was unusual. "There were these bursts where my heart would beat really fast for a couple of minutes, but then they would be gone," said Thompson, now 63, and a nurse at Kaweah Delta Medical Center.
Spotlight Interview - Kaweah Delta Medical Center
The EP lab was started from the ground up with new staff, because there was no EP service in the area prior to Dr. Bhajal. Within one year from the opening of the lab, we were performing more than 500 procedures annually.
Spolight Interview - Kaweah Delta Medical Center
A healthy heartbeat is the foundation of a healthy life. At Kaweah Delta's new Electrophysiology Laboratory, set to open in April, heart specialists and state-of-the-art technology are dedicated to the treatment of patients with irregular heartbeats and other conditions related to the heart's electrical system.
A Doctor with Heart: Sukh Bhajal
Electrophysiology cardiologist Sukh Bhajal, MD, has recently joined the Kaweah Delta team, bringing new, specialized services in cardiac care. A state-of-the-art electrophysiology (EP) cardiology laboratory is being developed especially to support Dr. Bhajal in diagnosing and treating cardiac problems related to the electrical and physiologic function of the heart.
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