Your Cardiovascular Disease Treatment - Best Hospitals And Best Surgeon Research
I’m not sure about you…
But, as I prepared for my heart valve surgery, one of the many critical questions I wanted to answer was, “Which are the best heart care facilities?” and “Who are the best heart valve surgeons?”
I did ALOT of research on the topic of cardiovascular disease treatment - best hospitals and surgeons. (So you know, I consider heart valve disease in the realm of cardiovascular disorders although others may consider the term isolate to arteries and veins.)
That said, a lot of my research ended up in my book. However, I have also placed a number of cardiothoracic surgeon profiles in this blog and within my website. I have posted profiles for each of the following heart surgeons here - Vaughn Starnes (Los Angeles), Paul Stelzer (New York City), Eric Roselli (Cleveland), Gosta Pettersson (Cleveland), Kevin Accola (Florida) and more.
Specific to the best hospitals for cardiovascular disease treatment, here is a link from US News And World Report that has some interesting information about the best hospitals for cardiac care in the United States. They list the top five heart specialty hospitals as:
- The Cleveland Clinic (Ohio)
- Mayo Clinic (Minnesota)
- Brigham and Women’s Hospital (Massachusetts)
- John Hopkins Hospital (Maryland)
- Massachusetts General Hospital (Massachusetts)
If you have any doctors or hospitals you would like me to profile in this blog, please let me know. You can email me or leave a reply below.
I hope this helps you know a little bit more on the topic of cardiovascular disease treatment - best surgeons and hospitals.
Keep on tickin!
Adam Pick is the author of The Patient’s Guide To Heart Valve Surgery, a unique book which integrates the clinical facts of heart valve surgery with the personal experiences of an actual heart valve surgery patient. This special book was designed to help patients and caregivers better understand the realities of heart valve surgery (heart valve replacement and heart valve repair), to minimize patient stress and to enhance the patient’s recovery. To learn more about Adam’s heart valve surgery book, click here.
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January 23rd, 2008 at 12:22 pm
Dear Adam,
I was wondering if you have any information about the surgeon who will be doing my mitral valve replacement in a couple of weeks? His name is Dr. S. Karwande, in Salt Lake City, and Orem, Utah. I googled him and found some information but nothing about heart valve replacements. The surgery will be taking place in the Timpanogos Regional Hospital, in Orem, Utah around the 5th of Feb. I meet with him on Friday, Feb 1st.
Thank you. You have a great website, and I have been impressed with it’s content.
Sincerely,
Bill Mikkelsen, Orem, Utah
January 23rd, 2008 at 4:53 pm
Hi Adam,
How about profiles on Craig Miller and Vincent Gaudiani? This will take care of Northern Califoirnia folks
and both are quite reputable.
Best regards,
Itzik
April 11th, 2008 at 12:47 am
Can you please give me the names of any surgeons in the Salt Lake or Denver region who do Heart Valve replacement surgeries. I am looking for a doctor who has a good reputation and is extremely experienced with this surgery.
May 9th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
Hi Adam and all - my double bypass and aortic valve replacement was on 4/14/08 at the Beth Isreal Deaconess Hospital in Boston, MA and I can’t say enough about my care. It was fantastic! I’m diabetic so my recovery is a little slower than normal but I’m still plugging along. I wish I had discovered this web site sooner - it has answered many questions, though.
Keep up the good work and good luck to everyone!
Ann Pecoraro
July 12th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
My husband has been diagnosed with aortic stenosis and has been told that he will require a valve replacement. In the past he has had one heart attack, one heart “event” and two stents. We live in Maine and had our first consult with a surgeon (for the valve replacement) who practices at Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor. We were told by the primary care physician that this particular surgeon is the best. We are somewhat apprehensive about just “going along” with this surgeon and have tried to do some research online. Information is so limited or we just haven’t found the right websites. We will buy your book in order to be better prepared, but we would still like to have some information about cardiac surgery up here. How do we find out if someone is truly “top notch?” We are three and a half to four hours away from Boston and did see two Boston hospitals listed among the top five on your website. My husband is scheduled for some more testing July 23rd. We are just wondering where to find information to better help us make a decision as to where surgery should take place and who should do it. Can you lead us to some websites that can help us? Do you have any information for surgeons in this area. Thank you, Pat
July 13th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Hi Adam, glad you enjoyed your trip to Hawaii! Congratulations on the anniversary.
I am scheduled for my operation on July 31 at Kaiser’s Moanalua clinic with Dr. John Chen. what do you know of this facility? I am told that this is one of the best. I guess I am not so thrilled with having this surgery and then getting on a plane 5 days later to head to Maui and then another hour drive to get home. I am somewhat frustrated by the lack of information from the medical community. I’ve found out most of what I know from your site! I don’t know if I should find comfort in that this is considered a commonplace surgery these days. I was told to take iron supplements but nobody seemed to know how much or what kind. Standing at the drug store counter was less than encouraging. By the time I figured out what I thought I should be doing, I was told I was too late and now am doing procrit shots. Whatever! I don’t want to go into this ticked off or having my doctors consider me noncompliant. Right now I’m about in a don’t care mode. just do it. thanks for the coumadin report. one more thing to consider! I will just have to put my trust in God and trust that He is really in charge! I know there are many people here on Maui who have gone through this and are functioning so much better than before, and that is my goal. thanks again for sharing your life! Aloha, Maureen
July 28th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
Hi Adam,
I am scheduled for a CT Angiogram on July 29 to confirm that I am a candidate for Mitral Valve Robotic Surgery. My surgeon is Dr. H. Kenith Fang at Banner Good SamaritanMedical Center in Phoenix, Az. He has done robotic surgery for a couple of years, but only 10 mitral valve surgeries. Does it matter that he has not done more surgeries in the mitral valve area or is this normal? Please let me know your thoughts. Thanks for your help.
Sincerely,
Mimi Wilk
Home phone: (480) 219-5731
July 28th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Hi Adam,
I am hoping that I would be a candidate for the daVinci assisted minimally invasive surgery.
My understanding is.that the daVinci assisted repair is far more successful at achieving a repair than the other 2 traditional procedures. 95% vs 50%. Also, less time on the heart-lung machine, less time in the hospital, much faster healing time, and less pain medication needed. Two weeks recovery and back to normal activities, and normal life longevity.
The pain factor is important as I cannot tolerate narcotic pain medications. In the past years I have had strong side effects with narcotic pain meds (woozy, spacey) with Percocet and Vicodin, and another I cannot recall the name, with very little pain relief. Then five years ago the morning after a TKR(Total Knee Replacement), I was on the morphine pump, and choked on my breakfast food. I was able to ring for the nurse and they found me unconscious. I had to be resuscitated by the anesthesiologist. Later I had several episodes of choking even on Darvon while in rehab. So I do not want to take any narcotic s for post-op pain control.
I have discovered that there is a new non-narcotic pain control system by iFlow called ON-Q, and it is being used for mitral valve repair, including the daVinci assisted repair. That is very reassuring for me.
At this point I am leaning heavily toward going to The Clevelend Clinic for the surgery for two main reasons:
They are rated #1 in USNews and World Report for heart care, and
They have two surgeons who have done a lot of daVinci assisted mitral valve repairs, Dr. Mihaljevic and Dr. Marc Gillinov. As a matter of fact, I watched Dr Mihaljevic doing a mitral valve repair with the daVinci assist on the internet the other day. Pretty cool.
I am somewhat familiar with the daVinci as my husband had a prostatectomy three years ago here in Manchester, NH. I could appreciate the difference in recovery post-op as I am a retired RN.
My insurance is Medicare with secondary at top tier, so I can choose my providers without going through hoops. We have paid through the nose for it, and it looks like it will have been worth it.
Also, I have been reading information on supplements for heart health and MVP on Dr Steve Sinatra’s website. I am a firm believer in integrative medicine, am interested in using Dr Sinatra’s approach to supplementation pre and post op.
I have been doing Dr Rinse’s Breakfast (as recommended by Dr Sinatra) for the past 10 days, and having less chest pain, breathing better, and no more “brain fog”.
Any thoughts? Profile info on Cleveland Clinic and the two docs?
Looking forward to receiving your book that I ordered Sat.
Winona Blake