New pacemaker enhances care

Pacemakers have been lifesavers for thousands of people every year.

But, as with all technology, pacemakers have limitations. The devices sometimes malfunction and require surgery to fix them. And data cannot be collected on the patient unless he or she stays in the hospital for a long period of time.

But the advent of a new wireless pacemaker from St. Jude Medical fixed many of those issues. The wireless pacemaker transmits data to physicians on a daily basis.

Olathe Medical Center physician Ravi Yarlagadda, MD, implanted the first wireless pacemaker in Kansas about three months ago.

He recommends and implants the device to as many as two or three people every week. Yarlagadda said the wireless pacemaker provides convenience.

The device works as a normal pacemaker, using small electrical impulses to stimulate heart muscles into a regular beat, but with a twist. It transmits data every morning at around 3 or 4, or after a “crisis,” to a box plugged into the patient’s phone line. A crisis threshold, which can include everything from an increased heart rate or a certain kind of fibrillation, can be custom set for each patient.

If the patient is traveling, the patient can take the box with them and plug it into any phone line.

Every morning, a nurse downloads the data. Nikki Chapman, an electrophysiologist at Olathe Medical Center, said she loves the device.

Chapman said that the patients love it too.

“They feel confident that we are watching them,” Chapman said.

She described the system as “very tight” and said she did not see any problems with the system.

Yarlagadda said he appreciates the technology because it allows for homebound or rural patients to get intimate and immediate care without a hospital visit. The wireless technology keeps track of large amounts of patients.

“One, it allows us to closely monitor our patients, even from remote areas, and two, it would automatically alert us if something really bad is happening to the patients, which is almost impossible if they don’t have this,” Yarlagadda said.

He and other physicians can also check the patient data via the internet, so they can keep tabs on their patients at all times.

The daily data download also supplies the physicians with large amounts of information that can check and corroborate what the patient says.

This data cuts hospital visits down to one per year.

“Who wants to come to a doctor’s office?” Yarlagadda joked.

This technology has also been applied to wireless defibrillators, which has already saved one of Yarlagadda’s patients. A man who had a wireless defibrillator fell off his tractor while working on his farm and broke his collarbone, which also snapped the lead of the defibrillator, rendering it useless. Once the man went back to his home, the defibrillator sent a red alert to the doctor, and the device was repaired within 24 hours.

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