New Wrist To Heart Procedure Offered In OKC

Imagine having your heart fixed through your wrist. It's now a reality at the OU Medical Center in Oklahoma City.

Heart patients traditionally undergo cardiac catheterization or stent procedures through the femoral artery or groin area. Now, OU Medicine cardiologists can perform the same procedures through the radial or wrist artery, which allows patients to experience shorter recovery times.

Cardiac catheterization is a procedure used to detect and identify cholesterol deposits that block blood flow through the arteries to the heart. Traditional heart catheterizations have relied on use of the femoral artery as a point of entry for the catheter tube. The catheter is inserted, and then guided through the artery to the heart. The procedure is much the same with the radial approach; however, the access point is in the wrist as opposed to the groin.

Benefits of the radial approach include:

• Shorter recovery time

• Less discomfort

• Less bleeding, thereby minimizing the potential need for blood transfusion and prolonged hospitalization shorter recovery time