Patients with cardiac and oncological diseases can have complicated thoracic surgery at St Petersburg University Clinic of High Medical Technologies
The Centre for cardiac surgery and interventional cardiology at the Pirogov Clinic of High Medical Technologies started a new area of work – thoracic surgery. Now, apart from cardiac, intravascular, hybrid operations, and surgical arrhythmology, doctors at the clinic operate on patients with thoracic diseases and combined cardiovascular pathology.
Doctors at the clinic have performed over 500 successful open-heart surgeries so far this year. The clinic ranks second among the 12 hospitals of St Petersburg that work in this field. In order to achieve this result, the doctors have been working hard for three years with the active support by Yury Fedotov, Senior Vice-Rector for Medical Care.
According to forecasts of clinical surgeons, despite the coronavirus restrictions, by the end of the year the number of operations will be higher than last year.
The range of cardiac surgeries, the services provided by the medical staff in different stages of treatment, and the level of performance are the same as those of the leading hospitals of Western Europe and Northern America. We implement the latest surgical, anaesthetic and rehabilitation techniques, as well as the most state-of-the-art technologies, which have been proved efficient by the World’s best medical centres.
Dmitry Shmatov, Doctor of Science in Medicine, head of The Centre for Cardiac Surgery and Interventional Cardiology, cardio surgeon
The Clinic of the University has started developing the areas of thoracic surgery and oncology, the most important and actual fields of medicine. Thoracic area deals with diagnostics and treatment of benign and malign tumours of thorax, lungs, pleura and mediastinum, as well as treatment of patients with combined cardiovascular pathology. Operations are performed with open and thoracoscopic techniques (by thorax puncture) with the use of the latest equipment. ‘In fact, our Cardio Surgery Centre is being transformed into a full-fledged Centre for cardio thoracic surgery and interventional cardiology,’ said Mr Shmatov.
In the clinic there are medical residencies for ‘Anaesthesiology and Emergency Medicine’ and ‘Cardiology’. Experts of the Centre for Cardiac Surgery and Interventional Cardiology are planning to work out teaching methodology for cardiovascular surgery medical residency.
Doctors of the clinic plan to extend the range of thoracic operations by implementing robotic-assisted surgeries with the use of the DaVinci surgical system. Minimally invasive and less traumatic techniques will allow patients to start rehabilitation on the third day after their operation.
Today, similar cardiac surgery centres in Western Europe belong to the category of reference clinics, which have not only proved their professional qualifications and effectiveness, but have also been granted the right to realise educational programmes for the residents and doctors from other regions. Many university clinics are reference centres for cardiac and thoracic surgery, for example, University Clinic of Leipzig and Cleveland Clinic.