Wellstar Treats Atrial Fibrillation with Comprehensive, Tailored Care

Wellstar’s Comprehensive Aortic Program has identified thousands of hidden aneurysms in the past two years. The goal of the program is to help people before their conditions become life-threatening.

Aortic aneurysms are bulges in the body’s largest blood vessel. They can burst and cause severe damage or death if they become too big. Unfortunately, most people never know they have one because they are typically asymptomatic until they rupture.

However, the aortic experts at Wellstar found a way to help people before they have an emergency.

“When patients have CT scans at Wellstar for other reasons, we use artificial intelligence (AI) to sift through them and find images of someone who may have aneurysm,” said Wellstar Cardiothoracic Surgeon Dr. James Ryan Burke. “That allows us to proactively contact them and bring them in if appropriate for evaluation to discuss that diagnosis.”

Since the program launch in July 2022, more than 4,700 people with aneurysms have been placed under surveillance—a protocol to monitor people who have a risk. Surveillance allows people to avoid undergoing unnecessary surgery but to know when the aneurysm grows larger and becomes a greater concern.

For people who had large, potentially life-threatening aneurysms, cardiovascular surgeons and vascular surgeons performed more than 700 advanced procedures at Wellstar Kennestone Regional Medical Center since the program began.

“These are major cardiac operations only performed in centers that offer complex aortic surgery,” Dr. Burke said. “The outcomes are best when done in experienced centers that do a high volume of procedures, like Wellstar Kennestone.”

Patient-centered aortic care

“This program is very patient-oriented. We have an excellent team of dedicated physicians at Wellstar to accomplish our mission and I think it’s very beneficial for both patients and physicians,” said Dr. Michael Corey of Vascular Surgical Associates.

The aortic program at Wellstar provides a higher level of aortic care than a patient would typically find in a local hospital. What makes the program unique is:

• The multispecialty team of aortic experts working together
• The cutting-edge AI technology used to identify patients who are unaware they have an aneurysm
• A high-tech hybrid operating room (OR) for open or minimally invasive procedures
• The latest surgical techniques and technology
• A high volume of procedures performed

“The aorta is the largest blood vessel in the body. It runs from the heart, through the chest and abdomen and down to the legs,” said Dr. Burke. “When you have a disease process involving the aorta, it requires multiple specialties.”

Wellstar’s specialized aortic team includes cardiovascular surgeons, vascular surgeons, cardiologists, anesthesiologists, radiologists, nurse practitioners and physician assistants.

There is also a cardiac hybrid OR that brings a catheterization lab and surgery suite together in one space, making aortic aneurysm treatment more efficient and encouraging collaboration between our expert providers.

“The hybrid OR is a state-of-the-art, innovative, open operating room where patients can receive complex aortic reconstructions—procedures that have open surgery components to them—as well as endovascular (or minimally invasive) aortic reconstructions. This all can take place in one nice operating room,” Dr. Corey said.

The aortic program is part of a larger heart care program at Wellstar, based at Wellstar Kennestone, the first in Georgia and the fourth in the nation to receive Comprehensive Cardiac Care Center Certification by The Joint Commission and American Heart Association. This is the highest certification in cardiovascular care.

Learn more or schedule an appointment with an aortic disease specialist.

Wellstar’s ongoing commitment to improving patients’ health and wellness was on full display when more than 100 cardiovascular healthcare providers gathered for the third annual Cardiovascular Quality Forum last spring. The forum, which was hosted at Wellstar Kennestone Regional Medical Center, serves as a way to share best practices across the Wellstar Center for Cardiovascular Care in order to enhance patient care systemwide.

“All of our Wellstar cardiovascular programs across the system are constantly working to improve clinical processes in order to improve patient outcomes, whether it be reducing mortalities, decreasing complications, reducing length of stay, etc.,” said Wellstar Quality Manager Dave Bloomquist. “Our annual Cardiovascular Quality Forum allows us to share the work being done at each individual hospital so all Wellstar hospitals can benefit from each other’s improvement efforts.”

The centerpiece of the forum is the poster competition, an idea borrowed from the American College of Cardiology’s annual Quality Summit. Each Wellstar hospital is encouraged to share its cardiovascular improvement successes in the form of a poster submission. Submissions can come from any stakeholder across the care continuum, including inpatient, outpatient, procedural, wellness and post-acute care areas. The posters are then judged by a panel of physicians using an objective scoring tool.

“After three years of holding this event, our physician leaders are still quite eager to devote the time necessary to score the ever-increasing number of posters,” Bloomquist said. “When we held the first Cardiovascular Quality Forum, we had 12 poster submissions. Last year we received 20 submissions, and this year we received 32 submissions.”

The posters represent the hard work from Wellstar teams to enhance and sustain a culture of high-level cardiovascular quality. This year, the top five posters belonged to Wellstar Kennestone, Wellstar MCG Health, Wellstar North Fulton, Wellstar Paulding and Wellstar West Georgia Medical Centers. Wellstar West Georgia earned the top overall score for its poster on decreasing telemetry calls, or the overuse of cardiac monitoring.

Additional highlights of the 2024 forum included a keynote address delivered by Mayo Clinic Cardiologist Dr. Abhishek Deshmukh and an awards presentation that honored Wellstar Cobb Medical Center with the overall cardiovascular quality award.

For the first time, the event also recognized outstanding provider leadership in quality. Wellstar Kennestone Cardiothoracic Surgery Physician Assistant Deleen Huff received the APP quality leader award, while Wellstar North Fulton Cardiologist Dr. Suresh Ramamurthy received the physician quality leader award. The awards are based on nominations, which may be submitted by any individual from any hospital.

“It was quite moving to read the nominations for physician quality leaders,” Bloomquist shared. “There was so much love and respect shown for our physicians by their clinical teams that it brought tears to my eyes as I read each nomination.”

Tears also flowed during the forum when a patient who survived a heart attack took the stage to share his testimonial alongside the Wellstar care team members who treated him.

“As we do each year, we invited a patient to join us to tell their story and recognize their Wellstar care team,” said Bloomquist. “There was not a dry eye in the room when the patient and his family told their journey at Wellstar—which ended with a left ventricular assist device (LVAD)—and thanked his care team for their love and care.”

As the Cardiovascular Quality Forum continues to grow, Wellstar patients will benefit greatly from care teams who are dedicated to improvement through collaboration. Bloomquist noted that the forum has been increasingly recognized by system leaders, including a number of hospital presidents who attend.

Looking ahead, Bloomquist said he is eager to see even more heart care leaders acknowledged for their contributions to the service line. “We will continue to grow the list of cardiovascular stakeholders that will be recognized for their improvement efforts to include inpatient nurses and EMS partners,” he shared.

The next Cardiovascular Quality Forum will be held March 2025.

Like most seniors, Ja’Quan Hart was very much looking forward to going off to college in the summer of 2023.

The Thomson, Ga., resident had just graduated high school and as a linebacker and tight end, helped lead his Thomson High School Bulldogs to win the Class AA State Championship.

“I had these big tackles, and I caught like an 89-yeard interception pass,” he said. “That was like my best game. We won state!”

Ja’Quan’s talent and skill on the football field—and his love of the game—earned him the opportunity to play for the University of Kansas with a full scholarship.

Unfortunately, life had other plans.

Amid packing for school and booking his flights, Ja’Quan learned from a routine sports physical that he had an irregularity in his heart that could be life-threatening.

That irregularity turned out to be a leaky aortic valve—and an abrupt end to his aspirations of a college football career.

“Blood was flowing back into my heart. It wasn’t going all the way through,” Ja’Quan explained.

In a healthy heart, leaflets between the left and right ventricles open to allow blood to flow through the heart one way and then close fully to keep blood from flowing back into the heart. In a condition like Ja’Quan’s, the leaflets do not close all the way and blood does leak back into the heart.

For most people the treatment for a leaky aortic valve involves a valve replacement. But a valve replacement now will often require another replacement surgery at some point in the future, and probably more than one, said Dr. Brian Bateson, a pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon and co-director of the adult congenital heart program at Wellstar MCG Health Medical Center. The younger the patient, the more potential surgeries the patient will need to have to replace the valves when they wear out.

Because Ja’Quan had not yet reached 20 years of age at the time of his care, a valve replacement would mean multiple surgeries over the course of his life.

The solution is a new device called the HAART ring that is affixed to the support structure of the aortic valve. This stabilizes the valve and allows for further repair of the leaflets themselves, meaning the valve can close properly and prevent leakage.

“If you’re using Ja’Quan’s own valve, keeping it in place and it functions, potentially he wouldn’t need another procedure again in his life because it’s still his own tissue. It’s not going to break down. Any prosthetic valve, whether it’s mechanical, bio-prosthetic will fail over time,” Dr. Bateson said. “Nothing’s better than what you’re born with.”

The HAART device is ideal for a young patient like Ja’Quan, but would also be a good treatment option for any person—pediatric or adult—with the same condition.

Ja’Quan spent three days in the hospital recovering from his surgery. Since, he has been slowly increasing his cardiovascular activity, such as walking, and following up with Dr. Bateson for regular checkups, who said he has been recovering very well.

Ja’Quan said he plans to continue to play sports, but will need to be more selective about the sports he can play.

“I play basketball. I just won’t be playing contact sports (like football),” he said.

Though he said it was disappointing to have to change direction as far as playing college football is concerned, Ja’Quan hasn’t let it dampen his spirit. Instead of college football, he is now exploring the possibility of driving trucks with the intention of going into business for himself—as long as it isn’t too strenuous for his heart.

“I’m not going to give up. I’m going to regroup and keep going and find another path to being successful in life,” he said.