Cardiac Services Director Highlights Value of TAVR Procedure

An online U.S. News and World Report story published yesterday focused on the transcatheter aortic valve replacement, or TAVR, procedure as a growing alternative to open-heart surgery. The story quotes a few expert physicians from around the country, including Edward McNulty, MD, medical director of Cardiac Services for The Permanente Medical Group in Northern California.

Dr. McNulty notes in the article that the minimally-invasive TAVR procedure – where patients remain awake as a catheter is threaded through the groin to place a new valve in the heart – is a “dramatic improvement in quality of life” for the patient. Kaiser Permanente Northern California performs about 300 TAVRs a year.

To learn more about TAVR and read the complete article, visit U.S. News and World Report’s site. For additional information on Permanente Medicine and cardiac surgeries, read this latest story.