SVMC cardiology

 

 

STRIVING TO IMPROVE YOUR LIFE ONE BEAT AT A TIME

You get one life and you get one heart. The board-certified cardiologists and associated practitioners at SVMC Cardiology are committed to helping you make the most of both.

Our patient-centered approach to care and personalized care plans maximize your quality of life while delivering the treatment you need when you need it.

Creating the appropriate treatment plan for your condition begins with a cardiac consultation. Your consultation is a chance for you to share your health history and current concerns with your cardiologist. All necessary exams and tests are conducted on-site by your cardiac care team. The results are shared and discussed directly with you so that you fully understand your condition, treatment options, associated risks, and potential lifestyle changes.

After a heart episode or surgery, there’s nothing our cardiac team and you want more than for you to just get back on your feet and live the life you want. That’s why we begin your rehabilitation program before you even leave the hospital. Through a combination of education and exercise, your personalized program will help you build strength and reduce your risk factors. Using the full range of cardio equipment in our Cardiac Rehab Center and under the watchful eye of our rehab team, you’ll improve your heart’s strength and capacity and get closer to resuming a full and active lifestyle. For more information about Cardiac Rehabilitation, click here.

In order to understand how well your heart is or isn’t functioning, an echocardiogram may be performed. This non-invasive procedure uses sound waves to produce images of your heart. Both of SVMC’s cardiologists are board certified in echocardiography and able to observe how your heart is pumping and identify any abnormalities in the heart muscle or valves. An echocardiogram allows our team to make the most informed and appropriate recommendations for the next steps in your care.

If a standard echocardiogram does not provide a clear image of your heart, your SVMC care team may recommend a transesophageal echocardiogram or TEE. Performed at the hospital, this procedure involves inserting a flexible tube containing a transducer down your throat and into your esophagus. From this closer vantage point, the transducer then uses sound waves to create more detailed images of your heart and allows for better diagnosis.

Before we treat your heart, we need understand how it’s performing. At SVMC we offer a number of non-invasive stress tests that can quickly and easily reveal a number of things including: how well your heart works during increasing levels of activity; how certain medications are impacting blood flow; the effectiveness of procedures done to improve heart performance; and more.

If you have risk factors for heart disease, calcium scoring may may help you learn more about whether you are actually at risk. The non-invasive test uses high-speed CT imaging technology to measure the hardening of the heart’s arteries, a leading indicator of heart disease and heart attacks. Visit the calcium scoring page for complete details. 

A pacemaker is one of the most effective ways to ensure a heart maintains a steady, healthy beat. The SVMC cardiac team is exceptionally skilled and experienced at both pacemaker implantation and monitoring. Considered a minor surgery, implantation takes place at the hospital with most patients returning to normal activity (and a more steadily beating heart) within a few days. Like all medical equipment, pacemakers need a little TLC every now and then. At SVMC our cardiac team can perform routine monitoring, both remotely and in the office, and reprogramming as needed.

One of the most common cardiac diagnostic tools, an EKG is a painless way to check for problems with the electrical activity of your heart. The EKG translates and records your heart’s electrical activity over a period of time and translates it into waves. Your SVMC care provider can use printouts of the waves to detect any patterns that might point to a specific condition and put together a treatment plan that meets your specific needs.

Should your SVMC cardiac care provider want to monitor your heart over a longer period of time than is practical for a standard EKG, you may be given a Holter or event monitor. Worn outside the body and completely painless, monitors are helpful in detecting abnormalities that only happen occasionally and can help your doctor link any abnormalities to specific activities or events in your day.

Carotid ultrasound
At SVMC our goal is to treat your health issues before they become problems. Using our sophisticated carotid ultrasound test, your cardiac care provider can detect blockages in your neck arteries that could lead to a stroke or indicate problems in other parts or your circulatory system.

Education
Because understanding what causes heart problems is essential to resolving them, we offer a variety of educational resources to patients and their families.  Workshops are offered on an ongoing basis throughout the Dartmouth-Hitchcock network, and condition-specific literature is available in our offices. 

SVMC Cardiac Rehab

SVMC Pulmonology

American Heart Association 

Go Red for Women 

American College of Cardiology 

140 Hospital Drive, Suite 211, Bennington, VT 05201
Phone: (802) 442-0800
Fax: (833) 343-1597

Hours:
Monday – Friday:  8:30 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Directions: 
For directions to SVMC Cardiology, click here. 

Parking:
For appointments at SVMC Cardiology, park in parking area P3 or P5.

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    Ticks: The Second Spike
    Administrator Account
    / Categories: WELLNESS, 2020

    Ticks: The Second Spike

    When the weather begins to cool, many of us begin to think that the health risks associated with summer—sun burns and heatstroke—are slowly disappearing. In many cases, they are. But the risk of contracting the diseases carried by ticks is still high until after frosts set in.  In fact, the prevalence of tick-borne diseases is almost as high in mid-October as it is in mid-May, when they are most active. The fall spike in tick activity relates to the adult ticks seeking their final meal before their long winter nap.

    Here’s what you need to know to get through this second spike in tick season without contracting one of the diseases they carry, like Lyme disease and anaplasmosis.

    Avoid tick bites by steering clear of wooded and bushy areas and those with tall grass or leaf litter. If you enjoy hiking, walk in the center of the trail. Use a repellent that contains 20 percent or more DEET, picaridin, or IR3535 on exposed skin, and follow the directions on the package. You can also treat your clothing with permethrin, which both repels and kills ticks. It is very effective against tick bites and poses no threat to humans. It is often marketed as “clothing and gear” spray. One treatment, following the directions on the package, will likely take you safely through the end of the season.

    Your next line of defense is to keep those ticks that found you from biting you. Change clothes when you come inside. Wash them in hot water and tumble dry. If possible, bathe or shower within 2 hours of coming indoors, as well.

    Conduct a thorough tick check. The most common type of tick in Vermont and the surrounding area, and the one that carries most of our tick-borne illnesses, is the black-legged tick. They are adults in the fall and are at their largest, which should make them easier to spot. Although, even a large adult tick is still pretty small. The body is only about the size of the letter “d” in the word dime on an actual dime. So look carefully. They can hide in and behind ears, under arms, in the groin, and behind the knees. Check yourself, have a family member check your back and other areas that are difficult to see, and check your children carefully.

    If you find a tick on your skin, remove it immediately. In most cases, you have at least 24 hours to find and remove a feeding tick before it transmits an infection. Use pointy tweezers or an aftermarket tick-removal device. Grab the tick as close to the skin as possible, and pull it straight upwards. Do not use any lubricants or hot objects. Leaving mouthparts in your skin does not increase the chance of infection. (They will come out on their own.) Disinfect the area with alcohol or other disinfectant. Identify the tick using online resources, if possible. Then flush it down the sink or toilet.

    Know the symptoms. Only just over half of Vermont’s black-legged ticks carry Lyme disease. Those carrying the other common tick-borne diseases measure around 5 percent. So just because you have been bitten does not mean you will be infected. At the same time, many of those who get a tick-borne illness diagnosis don’t recall having been bitten. So, it's important to know the symptoms and watch for them.

    Symptoms of Lyme and anaplasmosis are similar. They include flu-like symptoms, like fever and fatigue; head, neck, and joint aches; and enlarged lymph nodes. Usually the symptoms come on suddenly. Only about 25 percent of people who are diagnosed with Lyme disease get the characteristic "bull's eye" rash. If you do notice symptoms, call your doctor right away. Symptoms treated early are less likely to make any long-term impact.

    Maintaining high awareness of ticks in the environment is the best way to keep from getting infected with the diseases they carry this fall.

    Donna Barron, RN, is the infection preventionist at Southwestern Vermont Medical Center, part of Southwestern Vermont Health Care, in Bennington.

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    Tags: ticks tick-borne disease fall

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