The Medical Center, Navicent Health is now one of the first hospitals in the Southeast to offer the world’s smallest pacemaker for patients with bradycardia, or an abnormally slow heart rate.
 
The Micra Transcatheter Pacing System is a new type of heart device that provides patients with the most advanced pacing technology at one-tenth the size of a traditional pacemaker.
 
Sixty-five-year-old Shirley Henderson of Dublin, Ga. was one of the first in the region to receive this new device when Felix Sogade, M.D. successfully implanted it in her heart at MCNH on Thursday, June 8, 2017. The grandmother of eight said she first realized she had a heart problem when she had trouble completing normal activities, like weeding her garden, and then began fainting during normal activities.
 
“I feel the difference. My heart was going too slow, but it feels more normal this way. Technology is great!” Ms. Henderson said with a laugh following the operation. “I didn’t think I’d ever be one of the first to try a brand-new technology, but I think it’s a good thing. It is in my ventricle, and it’s not painful at all. I came out feeling good.”
 
Ms. Henderson looks forward to returning to normal activities, including her Silver Sneakers exercise classes, and being able to finish her workouts without growing too tired to finish.
 
Bradycardia is a condition characterized by a slow or irregular heart rhythm, usually fewer than 60 beats per minute. At this rate, the heart is unable to pump enough oxygen-rich blood to the body during normal activity or exercise, causing dizziness, fatigue, shortness of breath or fainting spells, like those Ms. Henderson experienced. Pacemakers are the most common way to treat bradycardia to help restore the heart's normal rhythm and relieve symptoms by sending electrical impulses to the heart to increase the heart rate.
 
“With Ms. Henderson, in her situation, she was blacking out and we decided to use this approach for her. She did very well with it,” said Dr. Sogade.
 
Comparable in size to a large vitamin, physicians at MCNH have elected to use Medtronic’s Micra TPS because unlike traditional pacemakers, the device does not require cardiac wires (leads) or a surgical “pocket” under the skin to deliver a pacing therapy. Instead, the device is small enough to be delivered through a catheter and implanted directly into the heart with small tines, providing a safe alternative to conventional pacemakers without the complications associated with leads – all while being cosmetically invisible. The Micra TPS is also designed to automatically adjust pacing therapy based on a patient’s activity levels.
 
“We selected this device because it represents one of the latest breakthroughs in pacemaker technology. Until now, physicians have implanted pacemakers in much the same way for the past 40 to 50 years. This pacemaker is revolutionary,” said Dr. Sogade. “Normally, if we have a problem with a pacemaker, it involves the wires, or leads, that connect the pacemaker to a generator and the heart. This new pacemaker bypasses all that. There is no wire, there is no generator. Everything is imbedded in a small device, and it is much simpler.”
 
Dr. Sogade also cited cosmetic reasons for choosing the Micra TPS.
 
“With this device, you cannot look at someone from the outside and know they have the pacemaker. When you have a condition, you don’t want to be reminded every day that you have that condition. With this device, there are no leads, it is completely imbedded within the heart, and there is no visible scar left following the surgery,” said Dr. Sogade.
 
The Micra TPS also incorporates a retrieval feature to enable retrieval of the device when possible; however, the device is designed to be left in the body.  For patients who need more than one heart device, the miniaturized Micra TPS was designed with a unique feature that enables it to be permanently turned off so it can remain in the body and a new device can be implanted without risk of electrical interaction.
 
The Micra TPS is the first and only transcatheter pacing system to be approved for both 1.5 and 3 Tesla full-body magnetic resonance imaging scans and is designed to allow patients to be followed by their physicians and send data remotely via the Medtronic CareLink Network.
 
The Micra TPS was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in April 2016, and has been granted Medicare reimbursement, allowing broad patient access to the novel pacing technology.
 
“At Navicent Health, we continue to seek new methods of navigating patients towards greater health and wellness. We are pleased to add the Micra TPS to our arsenal of tools as we navigate patients towards greater heart health, improved quality of life, and lengthened lifespan,” said Christopher Hendry, M.D., Chief Medical Officer for Navicent Health.