Chennai: Interventional Cardiology team of Apollo Hospital, Chennai performed India’s first commercial coronary shockwave lithotripsy yesterday to open a severely blocked artery of the 81-year-old man who had highly complex blocks that were very hard and calcified. “It was a challenging case and we had to perform Rotablation and then deliver the lithoplasty balloon. We did imaging with OCT and showed excellent results with a breakage of calcium,” said Dr GS Sengottuvelu, Senior Consultant & Interventional Cardiologist, Apollo Hospitals.
This breakthrough procedure brings hope to several patients with an advanced complex form of coronary artery disease (CAD), where the blockage becomes very hard due to the deposit of calcium. Treating hardened calcific blocks has always been challenging while doing angioplasty and stents. Such blockages are quite common and often seen in elderly patients can now be safely opened with these new therapies. Pulsation sonic pressure waves are delivered through a specialized balloon with this intravascular lithotripsy therapy which breaks up and softens calcium, without the risk of major injury to the blood vessel. After that, the blockage can be opened easily with a balloon and stent. This therapy is advantageous over the existing rotablation as the deep calcium can be penetrated allowing the stents to expand better giving better long term results Dr Sengottuvelu said.
