KUALA LUMPUR — A medical team from the National Heart Institute (IJN) has successfully installed a dual chamber pacemaker on a pregnant patient without exposing her to radiation.
IJN interventional electro-physiology and implantable devices clinical director Dr Azlan Hussin disclosed that the insertion of the device was done with a non-fluoroscopic imaging technique, the first in the country, on a 30-year-old housewife, last Monday.
Speaking to reporters here yesterday, Dr Azlan said the patient, who hails from Perak, suffered a slow heart beat known as arrhythmia or abnormal heartbeat which was only discovered late in the second trimester.
Without disclosing the patient’s name, Dr Azlan said she is currently is about six months pregnant with her first child.
He said the device was placed in the chest to help control her abnormal heart rhythms to mitigate complications during the pregnancy and delivery.
“We used a magnetic system to create the outline of the heart by magnetic positioning and re-positioining the lead or wire for the pacemaker, also known as Ensite-NavX system.
“There is no radiation involved unlike the normal procedure to implant the device during the surgery,” he said.
He explained that the virtual image was created by interfacing within the wires of the system that were being placed into the vein through the feet, and connected to a machine to monitor the image.
Describing the new method as a creative and safe method, he said it needed a lot of work and ‘imagination’ to bypass the fluoroscopic technique.
Noting that the patient felt more energetic and happy with her health progress after the installing of the pacemaker, Dr Azlan admitted that he himself was still feeling ‘over the moon’ over the success.
– BERNAMA
