Windsor Regional Hospital has added a new specialized vascular surgery that improves patient outcomes, keeps patients close to home, and saves the hospital money.
Since October 2022, the hospital began performing Endovascular Aneurysm Repair (EVAR). This is used to repair aortic aneurysms and manage other aortic pathologies.
An aortic aneurysm is a potentially life-threatening dilatation of the largest blood vessel in the body.
Previously, this complex problem was treated with a long operation that often resulted in complications. Patients required multiple nights in the ICU and up to a two-week hospital stay. Patients who could not undergo the lengthy surgery were often sent out of town.
With the EVAR procedure, the aneurysm is repaired using tiny punctures in the groin to insert special devices called stent grafts. This procedure typically takes around two hours, less than half the time of the previous procedure.
"We do everything under ultrasound guidance. Patients are left with half a centimetre incision in their groin after all is said and done," said Dr. Maher Sabalbal, a vascular surgeon. "And then within a couple of days, they are home, they are feeling 80, 90 per cent and within two or three weeks it's like nothing happened."
The hospital purchased a specialized surgical table and the specific tool for the procedure for around $400,000.
To date, the hospital has completed 20 procedures.
"Our hope is that this becomes the standard of care for managing patients with aortic aneurysms and some other diseases or obstructions in the big arteries," said Dr. Sabalbal.