The Department of Cardiology, SK Institute of Medical Science, Srinagar has achieved another milestone of performing highly complex coronary angioplasties using rotational atherectomy with intravascular ultrasound guidance.

Head of Department (HOD) Cardiology, Dr Nisar Ahmad Tramboo while giving details on May 3 said that three patients were recently admitted in the department with coronary artery disease (Heart attack) and underwent successful percutaneous coronary intervention using these techniques.

He said these patients were found to have highly complex and calcified blocks in left main coronary artery and other major vessels on coronary angiography which pose a serious threat to the patient’s life and daunting challenge to interventional cardiologists. Intravascular ultrasound, a cutting edge technique that is being performed routinely in the department now for past few years helps in identifying and characterizing these lesions and is utilized for optimization of angiography procedures to provide the best possible results to the patient at par with leading centers across the world.

Rotational atherectomy uses a diamond drill to modify hard and calcified blocks in coronary arteries and facilitates deployment of stents across these lessons which are otherwise difficult to tackle with routine angioplasty techniques, he further added. Director SKIMS, Dr Omar Javed Shah complimented the Department and said that these procedures puts our department at par with state of art cardiac centers globally as far as coronary angioplasties are concerned. Earlier the patients had to move out of the state and sometimes outside the country to get these procedures done. By making these facilities available locally, not only do we provide convenience to the patients, but we also cut down the costs drastically.