Previous Issues

BIDMC Nurses Honored at Fenway

At right: BIDMC clinical nurses
Ciara Daly, RN; Nichole Simms, RN; Crystal Grimes, RN;
and Sulekho Egal, RN

BIDMC's annual Nursing Awards ceremony took place at a special location this year. Read all about it here.

 

BIDMC’s Hybrid OR Leads the Nation

Pictured: BIDMC’s new Hybrid OR and (l-r) Canacari, Carrozza, de la Torre, Garcia, Josephson, and Pomposelli.

What do you get when you bring highly advanced cardiovascular services together into one operating room? Eight hundred square feet of pure patient care innovation.

BIDMC’s new hybrid catheterization/surgery/
electrophysiology (EP) operating room on the fifth floor of the west campus Clinical Center is the only one of its kind in the United States.
“A handful of other hospitals have combined surgery and catheterization, but we’ve taken it a step further by adding EP,” notes Ralph de la Torre, MD, section chief of cardiac surgery and a specialist in minimally invasive heart valve repair and replacement.

The hybrid OR combines highly advanced equipment, skilled surgeons, cardiologists and anesthesiologists, and specialized nursing and technologist staff to perform complex cases that involve two or more major services. The obvious advantage, says Georgann Bruski, manager of invasive cardiology, is a matter of time and space. “Previously, a patient undergoing a catheterization one day might have had to return another day if surgery was needed,” she says. Elena Canacari, RN, director of peri-operative services, notes, “Even in complex cases, staff would often have to move a critically ill patient from one floor to another for treatments.” The hybrid OR negates the need for many of these waits and moves.

Joseph Carrozza, Jr, MD, section chief of interventional cardiology, observes that BIDMC cath labs have already been the scene of combined diagnosis and catheter-enabled treatment in one session, but the hybrid OR takes potential treatment to an even higher level. “This one-of-a kind suite, with state-of-the-art digital flat panel imaging, allows us to offer advanced treatments to the most challenging and complex patients with cardiovascular disorders,”he says. Lawrence Garcia, MD, director of the peripheral intervention program, agrees, “This allows all operators to treat some of the most complex and high-risk patients in one setting – a truly unique opportunity for patient care.”

Mark Josephson, MD, chief of the cardiovascular medicine division and director of BIDMC’s arrhythmia service, notes: “Electrophysiologists have partnered with cardiothoracic surgeons to perform the first minimally invasive MAZE procedure to cure atrial fibrillation in Boston. Epicardial and endocardial ablation and resection for malignant ventricular arrhythmias can be performed in the combined suite. This room allows for simultaneous catheter and surgical interventions for both atrial fibrillation and ventricular tachycardia.”

The hybrid OR advances the ongoing collaborative work of vascular/endovascular and cardiac surgeons, says Frank Pomposelli, MD, chief of vascular and endovascular surgery. “Together, we have developed techniques for treating high-risk cases such as the placement of extremely complicated thoracic stent grafts,” he says. “These hybrid procedures, combining open and minimally invasive techniques or multiple minimally invasive procedures, are performed by truly hybrid teams. State-of-the-art angiography equipment and other technologies in the hybrid OR provide tremendous advantage for these complex cases.”

In BIDMC's Hybrid OR

Interventional/diagnostic catheterization – interventional: stents and other procedures to open clogged arteries using tiny instruments threaded through major arteries guided by radiologic imaging; diagnostic: important heart function information before and after procedures

Surgery – a wide range of procedures to bypass blocked arteries or repair defects such as holes or diseased valves. Open heart procedures can be done in the new OR, but the emphasis is on minimally invasive procedures performed through key-hole sized incisions. Also present may be endovascular surgeons – those who work on carotid (neck) and other vessels

Electrophysiology – treatment for patients who have with heart rhythm problems, from implanting pacing devices to ablation, using instruments threaded through catheters to alter heart tissue that is the source of rhythm dysfunction