July 2005

Dr. John Puskas Featured in an Article Highlighting the "Off Pump" Coronary Bypass Procedure in the July 2005 Issue of Newsweek

Nationally, about one in five coronary bypass operations are now done on beating hearts. Known as "off-the-pump" surgeries because they don’t require rerouting the patient’s blood through a heart-lung machine, the technique — and Emory heart surgeon Dr. John Puskas — were featured in Newsweek in July 2005.

"It’s a beautiful operation," says Dr. Puskas, who has performed the procedure nearly two thousand times since 1996. In a beating-heart bypass, as in a traditional bypass, the surgeon takes arteries from the patient’s arms or legs, connects them to the aorta, and bypasses blocked coronary arteries. But only the tiny area of the heart being worked on is immobilized.

Whether to go on or off pump is hotly debated in the field, with some cardiac surgeons standing by the traditional method.

In a review by Dr. Puskas of nearly two hundred cases, off-pump patients lost less blood during surgery, had less damage to their hearts, left the hospital one day sooner and recovered more quickly than their on-pump counterparts.

Nearly 140,000 bypass operations were performed last year — 21 percent of those on a beating heart.

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