Baptist Health Paducah introduces new heart failure monitoring system

PADUCAH, KY (KFVS) - Baptist Health Paducah is now offering a new miniaturized, wireless monitoring sensor to manage heart failure.

The CardioMEMS HF System is the first and only FDA-approved heart failure monitoring device proven to significantly reduce hospital admissions when used by physicians to manage heart failure.

The CardioMEMS HF System features a sensor that is implanted in the pulmonary artery during a non-surgical procedure to directly measure pressure. Increased pressures appear before weight and blood pressure changes, which are often used as indirect measures of worsening heart failure.

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The new system allows patients to transmit daily sensor readings from their homes to their health care providers allowing for personalized and proactive management to reduce the likelihood of hospitalization.

"Fluid congestion symptoms traditionally have to be recognized by the patient or a medical provider before medication changes can be made to combat those symptoms. This device allows providers to receive data transmitted wirelessly from the patients, allowing them to better tailor care with precise adjustments of medications on a day-by-day basis, hopefully before they ever experience symptoms of worsened fluid congestion, like worsened breathing," said Cardiologist Martin Rains, MD, who performed the first procedure at Baptist Health Paducah.

Data from a clinical trial showed that the CardioMEMS technology reduces heart failure hospital admissions by up to 37 percent.

The CardioMEMS HF System, from global medical device manufacturer Abbott, is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for commercial use in the U.S. For more information, visit here.

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