A pacemaker implant patient can now go for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), which may be important to plan further treatment.
A pacemaker implant patient can now go for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), which may be important to plan further treatment. With the latest pacemaker, which now commercially available in India, patients receiving the pacing system will be able to undergo MRI scans under certain conditions which represent a major milestone in the
evolution of implantable cardiac devices.
With the prior implanted pacemakers, patience’s were not able to undergo a MRI scan safely because their device could interact with MRI machines, potentially affecting the device or patients safety. Different then earlier the new system includes modified hardware to minimise the level of energy transmitted through the device connection point. It includes features designed to eliminate the impact of MRI-generated electrical noise, as MRI scanners may cause traditional pacemakers to misinterpret this noise and as a result withhold or deliver unnecessary pacing therapy.
“MRI is an invaluable medical diagnostic tool especially for diseases of the brain, spine, spinal cord, joints and muscle as well as for imaging the liver, gallbladder, pancreas, kidneys, bladder and the blood vessels. Until now patients with implanted pacemaker have been prohibited from getting investigated with MRI, which is a safe and non-invasive diagnostic tool without any side effects as compared to other imaging modalities due to MRI-Device interference,” said Dr Shomu Bohra, cardiologist and cardiac arrhythmia specialist, Baroda Heart Institute.
“MRI diagnostics is vital for the elderly-who are most likely to require implanted cardiac devices but are not able to avail the benefit of MRI diagnostics with their prior implanted devices,” he added.
According to estimates, 50-75% of patients worldwide with implanted cardiac devices are expected to need an MRI scan during the lifetime of their devices. For such patients, the modalities of investigation may sometimes not provide the definite diagnosis and sometimes such patients are subjected to more invasive testing or other modes of investigations in which high radiation exposure is needed to come to definite diagnosis.
A city-based heart care institute has implanted the latest pacemaker system designed for safe use with MRI machine. Dr Bohra claimed that this kind of implantation has been done for the first time in Gujarat.
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