A wide variety of interventional treatment options are available from Valley’s comprehensive interventional cardiology program.
Interventional procedures are those in which catheters or other devices are inserted through blood vessels to diagnose and treat disease. Using a wide range of the most sophisticated technology available, from imaging equipment to implantable devices such as drug eluting stents, patients who come to Valley are offered state-of-the-art cardiac care in our high-risk Catheterization Laboratory.
Procedures include coronary angioplasty, coronary stents, intravascular ultrasound and the implantation of pacemakers and defibrillators.
Angioplasty is an interventional technique in which a balloon catheter is inserted into a coronary artery. The balloon is inflated, and the plaque causing a blockage is compressed against the wall, opening the artery.
Other techniques to open the artery include atherectomy and the use of stents. Directional atherectomy is performed with a special catheter that shaves off plaque and removes it when the device is withdrawn. Rotational atherectomy is performed for patients in whom a blockage has been longstanding and heavily calcified. The procedure uses a rotoblader™ to open a channel for blood flow.
Other procedures involve stents — tiny metal lattices that are stretched tightly over a deflated balloon. The assembly is positioned in the middle of the blockage and the balloon inflated. The action springs the metal stent against the wall of the artery, holding the blockage material out of the center of the artery. The balloon is then deflated and removed.
For more information, please call 201-447-8456.