Heart Rhythm Center

Heart rhythm disorders are the result of electrical problems of the heart.

At UVA, we're the pioneers of many innovative treatments and advances in the management of heart rhythm disorders (called arrhythmias), including:

• Atrial fibrillation
• Atrial flutter
• Bradycardia (slow heart rates)
• Ventricular tachycardia

Our Heart Rhythm Center Services Include:

Device Service   

Our Device Service monitors, evaluates and manages patients with pacemakers and defibrillators implanted for certain rhythm disturbances.

Complex Device Management

• Our doctors perform more than 500 device procedures each year, including implanting devices that can pace both ventricles to improve heart failure symptoms (cardiac resynchronization therapy or CRT), and defibrillators (ICDs) that treat dangerous ventricular arrhythmias.
• We’re one of a few centers in the state to do complex laser lead extraction (removal of the wires connected to an implanted device because of scarring, infection or damage).
• We’re also a referral center for patients with complex device issues.

Device Clinic

• Our nurse-run Device Clinic, led by an EP (electrophysiology) practitioner, monitors and manages about 4000 cases each year.
• We troubleshoot complex heart device issues and offer remote monitoring to all of our patients with ICDs. So your device data can be sent from your home to our nurses, meaning fewer hospital visits for you.

Ventricular Tachycardia (VT) Program

Our program treats patients who have VT, a condition where the heart beats too rapidly (more than 100 beats per minute) and the ventricles can't pump enough blood to the rest of the body.

Treatment options include:

• Radiofrequency catheter ablation: An EP doctor (electrophysiologist) uses an electrical current to destroy tissue that causes the VT.
• Epicardial ablation: We’re one of a few centers in the country to do this procedure, where small incisions are made below the ribs to treat VT coming from the outer part of the heart.
• Implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD): This device regulates the heart's rhythm with electrical therapy.
  

Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy

CRT (also called "biventricular pacing") is used to treat heart failure patients who have an electrical abnormality in the heart that causes the left and right ventricles to beat out of sync.

• With our CRT program, patients are treated by both an EP doctor who specializes in CRT device management and a heart failure doctor who specializes in the overall management of heart failure therapy.
  
• By working together, the doctors effectively manage medication and device programming.

Atrial Fibrillation Center

Our Atrial Fibrillation Center, one of the first centers in the country focused on the condition, has treated more than 3,000 patients. This experience allows us to provide a very personalized evaluation and comprehensive treatment plan for each patient.

Get more details about afib treatment at UVA.