Health
Norwalk Hospital completes first year of providing life-saving emergency angioplasty
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Jul 15, 2010 - 1:29 PM

Norwalk Hospital completed its one year anniversary of performing life-saving emergency angioplasty, almost doubling the number of cases required by the State to operate this program.

David P. Lorenz, MD, interventional cardiologist with Cardiology Associates of Fairfield County and director of the cardiac and vascular catheterization laboratory at Norwalk Hospital, performed the first emergency angioplasty case at Norwalk Hospital on July 10, 2009 and 65 additional cases were since performed during year one.

In addition, Norwalk Hospital's average "door to balloon time", a standard measure of a hospital's speed of care, is considerably faster than the national average. According to Anne Bartolone, Manager of the Komansky Cardiac and Vascular Center, "The excellent door to balloon times can be attributed to the pre-hospital EKGs which are performed by paramedics and transmitted wirelessly to the Emergency Department."

"This system provides a quick and very accurate transmission of the EKG's. Our Paramedics are able to read and interpret the 12-lead EKGs; with the added advantage of having the Emergency Department physician looking at the same EKGs. This allows the EMS staff to treat the patient with physician involvement and the Emergency Department physician to accurately activate the emergency angioplasty response team," said Alan Henschke, director of the Norwalk Hospital EMS.

“Emergency angioplasty is a procedure in which the interventional cardiologist opens clogged arteries with tiny balloon-type devices in order to restore blood flow,” explained Dr. Charles Augenbraun, chief of cardiology at Norwalk Hospital. Performing emergency angioplasty within 90 minutes of arrival at the hospital has proven to be the most effective intervention in saving lives and minimizing heart damage for people suffering an acute heart attack. A heart attack occurs when a major artery supplying blood to the heart becomes blocked, generally from a build-up of plaque. According to the American Heart Association, the symptoms include:

- Chest discomfort, usually in the center of the chest that lasts more frequent than a few minutes or that goes away and comes back. It can feel like uncomfortable pressure, squeezing, fullness or pain.
- Pain or discomfort in one or both arms, the back, neck, jaw or stomach
- Shortness of breath with or without chest discomfort.   
- Breaking out in a cold sweat, nausea or lightheadedness 

"Anyone experiencing these symptoms should call 9-1-1 right away. During the past year, many of our patients called 9-1-1, but going forward, we would like to see ALL of our patients call 9-1-1 for chest pain," Ms. Bartolone said.

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