David Albers/Staff - Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Brian Hummel evaluates the deployment of a transcatheter heart valve replacement surgery at Lee Memorial's HealthPark on Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012, in Fort Myers. The non-invasive heart valve replacement surgery is a newly approved treatment for severe aortic stenosis, a condition where calcium builds up in the aortic valve inhibiting proper blood flow. The non-invasive transcatheter heart valve replacement is a new option for patients unable to endure open heart surgery.
David Albers/Staff - Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Brian Hummel evaluates the deployment of a transcatheter heart valve replacement surgery at Lee Memorial's HealthPark on Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012, in Fort Myers. The non-invasive heart valve replacement surgery is a newly approved treatment for severe aortic stenosis, a condition where calcium builds up in the aortic valve inhibiting proper blood flow. The non-invasive transcatheter heart valve replacement is a new option for patients unable to endure open heart surgery.
Transcatheter heart valve replacement surgery at Lee Memorial's HealthPark
* David Albers/Staff - An Edwards Lifesciences brand SAPIEN Transcatheter Heart Valve with the RetroFlex 3 Transfemoral System is prepared to be implanted into patient during a transcatheter heart valve replacement surgery at Lee Memorial's HealthPark on Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012, in Fort Myers. The non-invasive heart valve replacement surgery is a newly approved treatment for severe aortic stenosis, a condition where calcium builds up in the aortic valve inhibiting proper blood flow. The non-invasive transcatheter heart valve replacement is a new option for patients unable to endure open heart surgery.
* David Albers/Staff - Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Brian Hummel makes two incisions to access the femoral arteries in a patient at the beginning of a transcatheter heart valve replacement surgery at Lee Memorial's HealthPark on Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012, in Fort Myers. The non-invasive heart valve replacement surgery is a newly approved treatment for severe aortic stenosis, a condition where calcium builds up in the aortic valve inhibiting proper blood flow. The non-invasive transcatheter heart valve replacement is a new option for patients unable to endure open heart surgery.
* David Albers/Staff - Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Brian Hummel makes two incisions in a patient at the beginning of a transcatheter heart valve replacement surgery at Lee Memorial's HealthPark on Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012, in Fort Myers. The non-invasive heart valve replacement surgery is a newly approved treatment for severe aortic stenosis, a condition where calcium builds up in the aortic valve inhibiting proper blood flow. The non-invasive transcatheter heart valve replacement is a new option for patients unable to endure open heart surgery.
* David Albers/Staff - Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Brian Hummel works with staff to insert a series of catheters along a femoral artery of a patient during a transcatheter heart valve replacement surgery at Lee Memorial's HealthPark on Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012, in Fort Myers. The non-invasive heart valve replacement surgery is a newly approved treatment for severe aortic stenosis, a condition where calcium builds up in the aortic valve inhibiting proper blood flow. The non-invasive transcatheter heart valve replacement is a new option for patients unable to endure open heart surgery.
* David Albers/Staff - Cardiothoracic surgeon Dr. Brian Hummel watches a CAT scan of his patient as he works with staff to insert a series of catheters along a femoral artery during a transcatheter heart valve replacement surgery at Lee Memorial's HealthPark on Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012, in Fort Myers. The non-invasive heart valve replacement surgery is a newly approved treatment for severe aortic stenosis, a condition where calcium builds up in the aortic valve inhibiting proper blood flow. The non-invasive transcatheter heart valve replacement is a new option for patients unable to endure open heart surgery.
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FORT MYERS — James Stewart knows modern medicine saved his life but he also points to a spiritual element.
"I feel I've been divinely blessed by the scientists who developed this procedure," the 82-year-old said.
Stewart became the second patient in Southwest Florida to undergo an aortic heart valve replacement without having invasive open-heart surgery.
Instead, the artificial value is delivered in a catheter through the femoral artery in the groin and maneuvered to the site of the diseased valve.
A team of cardiac specialists started doing the procedure, technically called transcatheter aortic valve replacement, in December at Lee Memorial's HealthPark Medical Center, south of Fort Myers.
A handful of patients who are too fragile for open-heart surgery have been treated so far.
The catheter-based approach for valve replacement will be a game-changer for people with severe aortic stenosis, caused by the buildup of calcium, said Dr. Brian Hummel, a cardiothoracic surgeon with Gulf Coast Cardiothoracic Surgeons in Lee and Collier counties.
It means patients who are inoperable and with limited life expectancy have an option that didn't exist for them before.
It is only approved, for now, for patients who are too high-risk for open-heart surgery, so most candidates are in their 80s or 90s. That's expected to change with newer generation catheter-delivered valves and more studies.
"I think it will become widely available," Hummel said. "I'm not sure it will truly supplant open heart. It's done all over Europe. (Our team) has been training for over a year."
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