Heart Rhythm Management

With every beat of your heart, life goes on. When your heart beats steadily, in good, normal rhythm, you’re more likely to enjoy an active, healthy life.

That’s why Premier Health focuses on helping you and your heart keep the beat. Premier Health keeps pace with advances in heart rhythm management to provide you treatments for heart arrhythmias, the many types of conditions that can take your heart out of normal rhythm.

These treatments are important, because when your heart’s electrical impulses aren’t timed properly, your heart will beat too fast, too slow, or in an abnormal pattern. This can lower your quality of life and lead to serious health complications such as stroke or sudden death.

Treatments For Managing Arrhythmias

Your health care provider may recommend medication and lifestyle changes as your first lines of treatment for an irregular heartbeat.

Many patients, however, find limited success with drug therapy and behavior modification alone – and may benefit from other treatment options, such as these provided by Premier Health:

  • Cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT), which involves placing a small electrical device (pacemaker or defibrillator) under the skin in the upper chest to improve the heart’s pumping action. This is a minor surgical procedure – not heart surgery – performed at a hospital. Wires lead from the device to the ventricles, or lower chambers of the heart. The device sends electrical pulses to each ventricle at the same time. This keeps the ventricles beating in sync. The type of device used depends on your needs. A biventricular pacemaker is one type of CRT, which helps the heart beat at a normal rate.
  • Premier Health provides pacemaker services at Atrium Medical Center, Miami Valley Hospital, and Upper Valley Medical Center.
  • Another type of cardiac resynchronization therapy is provided with the biventricular implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD). A biventricular ICD is a pacemaker that can also treat fast, life-threatening heart rhythms.
  • Biventricular ICD servicesare offered at Atrium Medical Center and Miami Valley Hospital.
  • Cardioversion is a treatment that returns a fast or erratic heartbeat to normal rhythm. Cardioversions are usually done as scheduled procedures and include:
  • Chemical cardioversion, which uses medication given by IV or mouth to change the heart’s rhythm
  • Electrical cardioversion, which sends an energy shock to reset the heart to a normal rhythm. Like defibrillation, electrical cardioversion uses a shock, but a defibrillation shock is not matched to your heartbeat and is typically done in an emergency to treat dangerous heart rhythms such as ventricular fibrillation. Patients undergoing electrical cardioversion are given medication to sleep through the procedure.
  • Cardioversion is offered at Atrium Medical Center and Miami Valley Hospital.
  • Catheter ablation  eliminates electrical sources that cause erratic heartbeats. A wire is guided into the heart to destroy the small areas of heart tissue that may be causing the abnormal heartbeats. Heat (radiofrequency) or cold energy (cryoablation) are the two most common ways to destroy abnormal heart tissue. Cardiac ablation is an alternative to long-term or lifelong medication therapy and is an option when medicine fails to control the heart rhythm problem.
  • Cardiac ablations services are offered at Atrium Medical Center, Miami Valley Hospital, and Upper Valley Medical Center.

Advanced Technologies To Correct an Irregular Heartbeat

Besides traditional ablation procedures, Premier Health offers these advanced technologies to correct irregular heartbeats:

  • The Arctic Front Advance™ Cardiac CryoAblation Catheter System is a minimally invasive procedure involving a catheter, a flexible tube, that is guided into your heart. A balloon, chilled by cryo, or freezing energy, scars and disables the heart tissue that sends out the electrical currents that cause arrhythmias.
    • CryoAblation services are provided at Atrium Medical Center and Miami Valley Hospital.
    • Watch an animated video that depicts the cryoballoon ablation procedure.
  • Stereotaxis is a robotic-assisted magnetic navigation system designed to help diagnose and treat common and complex arrhythmias, such as atrial fibrillation and ventricular tachycardia. It combines the benefits of precise, computer-aided guidance through delicate, often hard-to-reach regions of the heart with soft, flexible catheters. This enhances the safety of ablation and reduces radiation exposure. Once in position, tiny electrical pulses are administered to correct the arrhythmia and return the heart to a healthy rhythm.
  • Premier Health’s Stereotaxis program is offered at Miami Valley Hospital.
  • Watch an animated video that depicts the Stereotaxis procedure.
  • The WATCHMAN™ Left Atrial Appendage Closure (LAAC) Device, introduced by Premier Health to Southwest Ohio, offers patients with atrial fibrillation (AFib) an advanced treatment option to reduce their risk of stroke. No larger than a quarter, the WATCHMAN Device is implanted in the left atrial appendage or LAA, a pocket located in the top left chamber of the heart. There the device prevents blood from pooling, clotting, and potentially causing a stroke.
  • This treatment can serve as an alternative for AFib patients who are taking the blood thinner warfarin, but have difficulty tolerating the medicine; are at increased risk of bleeding complications; or must limit their activities due to the medicine.
  • Watch an animated video to watch how this device is implanted.

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Every moment of your life depends on a strong, healthy heart. The Premier Health cardiology and vascular services team is here to help you, each beat of the way, with prevention, diagnostic, treatment, and rehabilitation services in our hospitals, outpatient centers, and medical offices across Southwest Ohio.