ST. ELIZABETH HEALTH CENTER At new lab, hearts feel at home with state-of-art care

A hospital official said the facility boasts the latest medical technology.
By WILLIAM K. ALCORN
VINDICATOR HEALTH WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- The Heart Lab, a new outpatient heart and vascular facility at St. Elizabeth Health Center, has an interior decor aimed at calming patients and family during what are stressful times.
Gurneys look like beds, vinyl floors look like wood, and wall and window applications in the eight patient rooms and elsewhere are done in earth tones. There are paintings on the walls and wooden armoires in the patient rooms.
The state-of-the-art medical equipment is here; it just isn't obvious.
Research shows that a more home- or hotel-like environment promotes healing, said Lisa Parish, vice president of heart and vascular services at St. Elizabeth's.
The Heart Lab, on the first floor of the $6 million, three-story, 30,000-square-foot building beside the hospital's main facility, opened about two weeks ago, Parish said.
Joint venture
Ground was broken June 12, 2002, for The Heart Lab, a joint venture between Humility of Mary Health Partners and several individual cardiologists and cardiologist groups, who own 49 percent of the facility and operate it. A ribbon cutting and blessing ceremony was conducted Thursday.
The third floor will house cardiac and vascular operating rooms. Use for the second floor is still in the planning stages, said Parish, though at the time of the groundbreaking, officials said open-heart operating rooms would be located on the second floor.
The Heart Lab has one catheterization lab, with room for a second if needed, she added.
"We want people to know that we have state-of-the art equipment here in Youngstown, and that they don't have to go to Cleveland or Pittsburgh for the best treatment available," Parish said.
What it's for
Patients are referred to the Heart Lab for catheterization and intervention procedures such as angioplasty and stents.
With the new equipment, including a smaller catheter that causes less trauma than older models, patients spend an average of only two hours at the facility, said Dr. David A. Hoffman, president of the Heart Lab's board of directors.
During a catheterization, a thin tube is inserted into a vein or artery so doctors can examine the structure, chambers, vessels and pressure of the heart.
In angioplasty, a balloon at the tip of a catheter is inflated inside an artery and presses the fatty plaque that has clogged the artery against its wall to open it up.
alcorn@vindy.com