The MedStar Health #cardiacsurgery team has a legacy of excellence. Now, we’re kicking it up a notch. Explore 4 key #patientcare initiatives we’re excited to achieve under the leadership of Chief Cardiac Surgeon, @abeel_mangi: https://bit.ly/3r8V8e9.
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2. Embedded surgeons in our communities.
Healthcare knowledge belongs to the people who need it—and we aim to share our expertise far and wide. As such, we are embedding our cardiac surgeons in the communities in which we live and work through:
- Social media outreach.
- Same-day virtual clinics for referrals and consultations.
- Staffing MedStar Health heart surgeons at more community clinics.
Social media platforms are a natural way to connect current and prospective patients with cardiovascular education. From self-care tips to identifying risks and recovering from surgery, our goal is to answer community members’ questions and reduce patients’ concerns about seeking care.
Through our same-day virtual clinics, referring cardiologists from any healthcare center can call to talk with a dedicated, on-call cardiac surgeon. We launched these clinics to answer patient and provider questions, expedite decisions around referrals, and reduce unnecessary patient travel.
In that same spirit, our cardiac surgeons will be staffing MedStar Health clinics closer to home for more patients. We are working to open a clinic in Reston, VA, another in Frederick, MD, and at least three more throughout the region. These clinics will deliver our top-tier surgical care to patients who wish to avoid traveling to Washington, D.C.,
3. Amplified patient and provider education.
As an academic medical center, MedStar Health is focused on educating not only our patients, but also our faculty and staff. The expertise of our providers is unmatched. However, we live for the challenge of “what’s next”: discovering, learning, and teaching the seemingly endless flow of cardiovascular advancements.
We take a multi-pronged approach to covering all these bases outside our clinical duties. First and foremost, we play an instrumental role in educating the public on the dangers of heart disease. It is our duty to empower community members to recognize and seek care for heart conditions at the first sign of symptoms. The earlier heart disease is identified, the better the chances for positive outcomes.
Secondly, we are kicking off a continuing medical education conference series this fall to give regional and national health care providers access to our surgeons’ expertise in four complex topics:
Our goal is to encourage early identification of complex conditions, so community providers can refer patients to specialty cardiovascular care sooner in the disease process. Additionally, each of our surgeons leads an outreach program, delivering presentations to community providers on various areas of cardiovascular interest.
We will also invite outside speakers to MedStar Health to share their knowledge with our surgeons. When we pool our collective knowledge, we improve our chances to increase community awareness and reduce the burdens of cardiovascular disease, at home and abroad.
4. Expanded research opportunities.
Every study we join has the potential to bring a novel treatment or rehabilitation approach to life or reveal a new utility for a proven therapy. Some of our recent trials have focused on:
- Advanced treatments to reduce kidney complications after heart surgery.
- Gene therapy for patients who are not eligible for heart surgery.
- New devices to potentially treat mitral stenosis and mitral regurgitation.
- Valve implants that can be placed through minimally invasive surgery.
In the future, we will develop specific channels of research within invasive heart surgery, including robotic surgery and further refinements to our exceptional heart transplant program and arrythmia surgery protocols.
For example, we were the first heart center in the region to offer the Epi-Sense System Hybrid AF Therapy by ArtriCure, a novel ablation treatment for atrial fibrillation that requires deep collaboration between our heart surgery and electrophysiology teams.
Our multidisciplinary mindset and focus on clinical research gives patients access to advanced treatments that are not yet widely available elsewhere. Explore current cardiac clinical trials.
Our promise to patients and the community.
We believe that each person should be treated with respect and dignity. We are thoughtful and deliberate about who we choose to operate on, always taking care to make sure that the benefits of heart operation far exceed its risks.
We are equally deliberate about making sure that every alternative treatment strategy has been thoroughly explored before making the decision to operate on someone, in close consultation with our colleagues from cardiology and other disciplines.
Ultimately, our goal is to ensure that each patient gets a therapy that is tailored to their own unique circumstances, and that they are intimately involved with that decision making process. That is how we accomplish the best cardiovascular outcomes for patients.
Do you need specialized heart care?
The cardiac surgeons at MedStar Health are here to help.
