Dr. Hussain–First Ever “Hybrid Vascular” Surgery

PEORIA, IL–The vascular surgery team at HeartCare Midwest made history September 10, 2010 at OSF Saint Francis Heart Hospital in Peoria, IL when it performed the first procedure in the world using a new hybrid bypass stent-graft technology in a patient with peripheral artery disease (PAD).

During an hour long procedure, surgeons Syed Hussain, M.D. and Jennifer Ash, M.D. implanted the hybrid bypass stent-graft into the leg of a 60-year-old Peoria, IL man with a blockage in the primary artery of his left thigh.

OSF Saint Francis Heart Hospital is one of only 16 centers in the U.S. participating in the research study of this graft that combines a traditional graft and a stent-graft. The next procedure using the hybrid stent-graft is scheduled for September 29, 2010.

The use of bypass grafts has served as the traditional treatment for PAD affecting the lower extremities. Stents have also been successful in treating PAD in the lower extremities, but their use is sometimes limited by anatomy or by plaque characteristics. According to Dr. Ash, lower extremity bypass requires the formation of two hand-sewn connection sites between vessels, one at the inflow site and one at the outflow site. The new hybrid graft combines the traditional bypass graft conduit with a covered stent. A bypass performed with this conduit requires only one hand-sewn connection since the end of the bypass graft which incorporates the covered stent is inserted into the patient’s blood vessel using a wire and a sheath. Once the stent-end of the bypass is deployed, the connection is essentially complete.

Members of the vascular team are most excited about what this could mean for their patients.

“These new technologies provide our team, and therefore our medical community, the opportunity to offer novel treatments for vascular disease that will – we hope – result in better, more durable outcomes,” said Dr. Syed Hussain. “Furthermore, these therapies will allow many of our patients to have procedures that require less anesthesia, shorter operative times, smaller incisions, less postoperative pain, and a faster recovery.”

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