Treatments Available for Heart Diseases

India’s leading cardiologist Padma Bhushan Dr. TS Kler, Chairman and head of cardiology, PSRI Heart Institute, New Delhi said –” Angioplasty is very well-established therapy, and now more and more patients of coronary artery diseases are treated with angioplasty rather than by-pass surgery.”

When is the need of Angioplasty or Why?

Whenever a patient has a blockage in the major artery which produces symptoms, or which is likely to produce heart attack, Fainting, Dizziness or light-headedness, Fatigue (tiredness), Shortness of breath, or Chest pain. those are the situations where stunting is advised.

 What are Angioplasty and Stunting Procedure?

Angioplasty or stunting procedure is used to treat coronary artery disease blockages. This is a technology that is done under local anesthesia without any surgery. We can go into the heart with specialized equipment and open those arteries with balloon dilation, and after that, and can implant a stunt.

what are the treatments available for Heart Failure?

There are a lot of treatments available for heart failure. Whenever we have a patient with heart failure, we have to investigate why the heart failure occurred. E.g. heart failure may occur because of person has a blockage in a coronary artery or somebody has a valve problem, either the valve becomes very narrow or leaks.

Suppose any patient has already done that treatment for example if somebody has a blockage you have done angioplasty or undergone bypass surgery and still, your heart is weak, then that is a real problem.  Because there are many patients all over the world who have refractory heart failure means which are not responding to usual treatment. For refractory heart failures, there are three modalities of treatment

• CRT (Cardiac Re-Synchronization Therapy): This is a specialized pacemaker that we can implant in the individual and patients feel better.  CRT is useful only in around 35% of individuals who have a broadening of their ECG QRS Complex.   We have seen some patients respond remarkably well.  This is not a complicated surgery and is done in local anesthesia.
• Cardiac Transplant: This is very much possible in India now. In our cardiac hospital in Delhi, we have done a few patients and fortunately, all have done well. It is a very effective treatment now
• The main problem with heart transplants is that we need a heart, supposing a heart is not available or the patient’s age is more than 65-70 years then a transplant is not offered. Then they can have an artificial heart, which is also called a left ventricular assist device, which is being done in the country, we have done that, and a lot of patients have improved. The only major limitations of the artificial heart are, it is expensive.

What happens when heart disease is left untreated?

If the heart disease is left untreated, obviously, patients will have bad quality of life, and ultimately most of them will die. If the heart is not able to pump enough blood in the body ultimately people die.