WYOMING, Mich. — An open heart surgery center in Wyoming just passed a major milestone. It has hosted 100 surgeries in less than a year.
In anticipation of the 100th surgery last week, FOX 17 gained exclusive access to an open heart surgery procedure to see how a new partnership in West Michigan is impacting people who live here.
Dr. Alphonse DeLucia, the lead cardiac surgeon at UMH-West, likens the operation to piloting an airplane.
"Obviously in the back of their mind, they know that they've got so many souls on the plane with them,” he explained. “And in the back of my mind, I have a person down here. But when you're in the zone, or in the moment, you're focusing on the task at hand."
And the flight plan ahead of takeoff early one Friday morning in August: coronary artery bypass surgery.
What they call a widow maker will be bypassed in part with a radial artery from the patient's arm over the course of four hours.
This procedure is one of 100 that have been completed inside the new state of the art operating room in its first ten months. That more than doubled the initial goal of 50 in a year. Leaders expect that by the end of the first year, they will have completed 140 operations.
Dr. Ronald Grifka, Chief Medical Officer at UMH-West, says that for the last 25 years, there's only been one open heart surgery program in Grand Rapids.
"Because of that, and the growth we've had in with Michigan, this really was the largest community in the country that just had one open heart surgery program," said Dr. Grifka.
Born out of that need, the Cardiovascular Center at the University of Michigan, UMH-West, Trinity Health Grand Rapids, and Trinity Health Muskegon partnered together to create the Cardiovascular Network of West Michigan.
"It's one seamless process, whether the patient is seen in any of those three facilities, they're all part of the same network,” Dr. Grifka said. “So, it takes the guesswork for the patient out of, ‘Am I getting the best option or getting the best care?’"
One year ago, Victor Cerbins asked himself those questions, but the brand new heart surgery network made his decision easier. Though, it didn't hurt that he already had connections to the University of Michigan.
"So I knew U of M was involved,” he remarked. “And I said, ‘Well, I have a lot of faith in the procedure from them. My daughter graduated from the nursing school there, and I have two granddaughters graduated from nursing school there. So I had some pretty good faith there."
Cerbins was case number one for the new center. By no means though was he a guinea pig.
"You are the first patient here, but you're not the first patient to have this done,” he assured himself. “And so, I felt comfortable"
While faced with an impending procedure that would have his chest cut open, exposing his beating heart, Cerbins considered what it may have been like for his wife had they not had service so close to their home.
"My option at that point would have been Ann Arbor possibly. And that's several hours away driving, and then my wife would stay there. Whereas here, she could just back and forth, because we're in Holland," said Cerbins.
It's that accessibility those involved with the network pride themselves on.
Dr. Theodore Boeve, another cardiac surgeon, lives and works on the lake-shore with Trinity Health Muskegon. He touts their own brand-new hospital and being fortunate to have great facilities in West Michigan that contribute to quality care.
"Our goal is 100% access for every community member to come in and get world class care. And I think that's what this network is going to help us do," said Dr. Boeve.
He says there's more to be done on the community scale however, and the cardiovascular network can make a difference.
"Until there's perfect access at great value, I think there's there's plenty of work to do and there's always ways to do it better,” he added.
The responsibility of quality care doesn't just rest on the shoulders of surgeons like Dr. Boeve and Dr. DeLucia.
Dr. Grifka explained, ”Cardiac surgery is really the ultimate specialty because it requires every specialty in the hospital to work at the top of its level between the respiratory therapist and the intensive care unit to nursing, radiology, laboratory anesthesia, on top of the cardiac surgeons.”
The operation we attended, nearly 100 away from Cerbins’ operation last fall, showcases the intricacy of the work in progress.
What’s clear is that Cerbins is not the only patient benefiting from proximity and the need in the fight against heart disease, as the growing number of cases pushes the hospital far beyond initial expectations.
The American Heart Association of West Michigan provided insight to the latest heart disease trends in the US.
- According to Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project data from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality for the year 2018, 481,780 non-invasive coronary interventions were performed on an inpatient basis in the United States.
- Data from the Society of Thoracic Surgeons Adult Cardiac Surgery Database, which voluntarily collects data from ≈80% of all hospitals that perform coronary artery bypass grafts in the United States, indicate that a total of 161,816 procedures involved isolated coronary artery bypass graft in 2019.
- In 2021, 3,817 heart transplantations were performed in the United States, the most ever. The highest numbers of heart transplantations were performed in California (529), Texas (359), New York (307), and Florida (263).
- Cardiovascular disease-related deaths jumped from 874,613 in 2019 to 928,741 in 2020, the largest single-year increase since 2015, according to the 2023 update to AHA's heart disease and stroke statistics. The number of deaths surpassed the previous high of 910,000 in 2003.
When we asked for specifics on first year heart surgery results at UMH-West, we were told it's well above the recommended standards from the Societies of Cardiac Surgery.
UMH-West says it is delivering on another of its objectives: reducing costs. They hesitated to provide specifics, but expect the first-year data to show significant cost reductions.
The patient receiving care when FOX 17 was present signed off on our cameras being there. He was discharged four days after surgery and says he is doing “incredibly well.”
