Banner Health among first to launch breakthrough heart technology

Banner Health is among the first in the country to offer breakthrough technology in the form of the smallest defibrillator of its kind.

The OmniaSecure™ Defibrillation Lead delivers life-saving shocks during dangerous heart rhythms while helping maintain the heart’s natural rhythm through a technique called physiological pacing.

Dr. Roderick Tung, Director of the Banner-University Medicine Heart Institute, joined “Arizona Horizon” to discuss this new heart technology breakthrough.

“A pacemaker is nothing but a medical device,” Dr. Tung said, “…that sits, usually above your chest, and is implanted under the skin…and is the guardian of the heart, and basically keeps up with the pace of the heart. Typically, it’s the slow heart rhythms that are giving people problems, and the pacemaker gives you a floor to say, ‘I’m not gonna go below that,’ and kicks in if the heart rate is too slow.”

Defibrillators are another helpful device that allows a significant amount of voltage or charge to rescue a patient and give a life-saving shock.

“Cardiac arrest is the number one leading cause of death in America,” Dr. Tung said, “…so this has the ability to be able to have a device that protects you from a life-threatening arrhythmia… So it’s an all-in-one combined first ever, that is the most miniaturized version we’ve seen.”

It is a very thin wire that goes across one’s chest, and according to Dr. Tung, typically, one would need two wires to get the job done.

“Kind of like when iPhone came out,” Dr. Tung said, “…and it’s like wow it’s a computer and a camera, amazing…and that’s what’s finally here in medical technology.”