Strengthening Weak Hearts

February 3, 2012

A unique potential solution in the pipeline is now being developed in Israel. The minimally invasive Optimizer III is a pacemaker-sized device that electrically stimulates diseased heart muscle, enabling it to contract more strongly and pump blood where it's needed.

Implanted in a surgical procedure under local anesthesia and sedation, the Optimizer III just needs to have its battery recharged at home weekly for about an hour. And it has lasting effects, strengthening the heart the same way any exercise builds muscle. “Patients are usually treated with medications that help the symptoms, but not the cause of the problem, or with implanted devices such as pacemakers or defibrillators. Nothing else targets the muscle itself, and nothing else actually ‘trains' the heart,” says Impulse Dynamics CEO Dr. Irit Yaniv.

If it's approved in the United States, the Optimizer will be a welcome advance for many of the 5 million people suffering from CHF. Patients with a pacemaker can have this device implanted as well, if they meet certain criteria.

The Optimizer III is a minimally invasive device that electrically stimulates diseased heart muscle Results in European patients, where the Israeli company has been selling the product for eight years, have shown improvement in quality of life and exercise tolerance, with a reduction of hospitalizations due to heart failure. Most patients start feeling a change just a few weeks after the implantation.

In many cases, the Optimizer has allowed people who couldn't get up a flight of stairs to start biking, hiking, and swimming. One 70-year-old German patient reported, “I cannot sit still. I am making up for what I couldn't do in the last few years. I have no restrictions.” For more information: www.impulse-dynamics.com, +49-2154 -884-6220.

Source: Excerpts of an article by Abigail Klein Leichman, www.israel21c.org