Perspectives of the heart

At the Congress of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) 2010, Siemens Healthcare has presented the company's innovative solutions for cardiology that provide higher quality of care and contribute at the same time to reducing costs in healthcare.

The objective is to diagnose heart diseases more effectively as well as earlier but also to enable new therapies that are more patient-sparing and accelerate treatment. Examples of heart disease include heart failure and coronary heart disease (CHD) - diseases that are increasing among people. In the advanced heart cath lab, innovative Siemens technology is already used today to replace a growing number of heart valves with a minimally invasive catheter procedure. This and other new procedures are applied primarily in hybrid ORs that combine the advantages of a cath lab with those of an operating theatre. In addition to medical imaging and lab diagnostics, the complete Siemens portfolio for cardiology includes cardiovascular IT solutions together with customer-specific services.

Currently, approximately 14 million people in Europe suffer from heart failure. It is estimated that this number will increase to about 30 million* by 2020. For many patients, the underlying cause is coronary heart disease (CHD), considered the most widespread disease in industrial nations. More than half of all people die from cardiovascular complications - one third of these suffer a heart attack. New medical approaches and imaging methods such as echocardiography, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), nuclear medicine, and computed tomography (CT) support faster diagnoses as well as more effective and earlier therapies. In the long term, useful applications of new technologies save expenditures in the healthcare sector and provide patients with faster diagnosis and therapy through further improved, gentler methods.

At the ESC, Siemens is holding a number of satellite symposia about the newest treatment methods in cardiology. The focus is on the therapy of patients suffering from heart failure, on people with acute chest pain, and patients with severe aortic valve stenosis. Speakers from Europe and the U.S. will present their audience with these topics during lectures and discussions. Under www.siemens.com/esc, interviews with leading cardiologists as well as video tapes of the satellite symposia will be available immediately after the congress.

As in the past, visitors of the congress have the opportunity to attend practical training sessions in the form of hands-on tutorials for the new Siemens technologies. These are performed by clinical experts and offered for typical reports in cardiovascular CT, MRI, echocardiography and interventional cardiology.

For more information go to www.siemens.com/healthcare and www.siemens.com.

*Source: Shape (Study on Heart failure Awareness and Perception in Europe; www.heartfailure-europe.com.