Susan Meyer has teaching...what are you looking forward to?

With her son''s wedding approaching, 55-year-old grade school teacher Susan Meyer had a lot to look forward to. Unfortunately, she was feeling too tired to do much celebrating.

Meyer had lived with mitral valve stenosis for 15 years, so she was used to feeling less than 100%. But in May of 2005, Meyer could tell something had changed. "I was tired all the time. My heartbeat had always been very irregular, but it was wearing me out more than usual," says Meyer.

A visit to the emergency room revealed she had atrial fibrillation, a condition which causes an erratic heartbeat.

A cardiac catheterization revealed multiple blood clots in her lungs. Meyer was immediately referred to Ralph Damiano, MD, chief of cardiac surgery at Barnes-Jewish and Washington University School of Medicine.

"By the time I saw Meyer she was past the point where medicines could help anymore and the only real option was surgery," says Dr. Damiano.

In July of 2005, Dr. Damiano gave Meyer a new mechanical mitral valve, repaired another valve, and performed a Cox-Maze procedure to correct the atrial fibrillation. First performed at Barnes-Jewish by surgeon James Cox, MD, in 1987, surgeons at Barnes-Jewish and Washington University have performed this operation longer than any medical center in the world.

In Meyer''s case, all these procedures performed by Dr. Damiano were minimally invasive, saving Meyer from the dramatic scarring and longer recovery of a cracked-sternum procedure.

Moreover, Dr. Damiano and his team at Barnes-Jewish Hospital have developed a new version of the Maze procedure in which most of the atrial incision has been replaced with linear lines of ablation. This has simplified and greatly shortened the time needed to perform the surgery.

"We''ve performed the Maze procedure on more than 400 patients total and more than 120 using the refined, less invasive technique," Dr. Damiano says. "The newer procedure is simplified and uses fewer incisions on the heart with equivalent results."

The current less invasive technique has a recovery period similar to bypass surgery. The procedure''s results are impressive with a 10-year, 95 percent cure rate of atrial fibrillation.

"I want people with atrial fibrillation to know they don''t have to give up hope, especially if they have severe symptoms because there are options there," Dr. Damiano says.

Options also include non-surgical treatments such as catheter ablation. Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University electrophysiologists are now developing techniques using a catheter as a first line of treatment for atrial fibrillation.

Currently, the cure rate for patients undergoing catheter ablation for atrial fibrillation is 60 to 70 percent. "Even in those not completely cured, the procedure is still beneficial," explains Bruce Lindsay, MD, director of clinical electrophysiology at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine. "After the procedure, many patients respond to medications that previously hadn''t worked."

For patients like Susan Meyer options like these have allowed her to get back to a regular life. She looks forward to enjoying special family occasions and keeping up with the first-graders in her classroom.

"I feel so much better," Meyer says. "I feel like I have my life back."