Specialized medical services

In our department, more than 60 cardiologists certified by the Japanese Circulation Society work together to diagnose, treat, and prevent cardiovascular diseases in general. In addition, we provide 24-hour emergency medical care in cooperation with the Trauma and Acute Critical Care Center and accept emergency cases such as acute myocardial infarction and heart failure. In treating heart failure, we are an accredited institution for heart transplantation, and we are working with a sense of mission as the "last bastion" of cardiology in Japan for all patients with heart failure from mild to severe. In particular, we have experienced many cases of cardiomyopathy, and we are making efforts in differential diagnosis, prognosis prediction, and treatment. For ischemic heart disease, in addition to the conventional multi-slice computed tomography and myocardial scintigraphy, FFRCT, which measures the degree of blood flow reduction in coronary stenotic lesions, was introduced in December 2020. Coronary angiography and percutaneous coronary intervention are performed after diagnosing coronary artery disease with less invasive tests. We actively treat patients with intractable arrhythmia by catheter ablation, pacemaker implantation, and defibrillator implantation. In addition, we also perform various catheter interventions for structural heart diseases. Please feel free to contact us regarding treating patients with cardiovascular diseases, including acute conditions.

Features

We are a certified institution for heart transplantation and ventricular assist device implantation. We are particularly active in the treatment of patients with severe heart failure, making full use of a wide range of diagnostic imaging tests to make a differential diagnosis of cardiomyopathy and then providing a wide range of therapies from drug therapy to biventricular pacing therapy and, in collaboration with cardiovascular surgeons, ventricular assist device implantation and cardiac transplantation. We also conduct many clinical trials and clinical studies at our facilities and partner with other nationwide and overseas facilities. In the heart failure care, we treat various cardiomyopathies such as dilated cardiomyopathy, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, sarcoidosis, and amyloidosis and focus on identifying the underlying disease through detailed examinations, including myocardial biopsy. We perform a wide range of therapies in arrhythmia treatment, including pacemaker implantations, ablation therapy, and lead removal using the excimer laser for pacemaker infection. We also manage implantable cardiac devices through remote monitoring. We are working on diagnosis and treatment for ischemic heart disease utilizing diagnostic imaging such as 320-row of multi-slice CT, FFRCT, intravascular ultrasound, OCT, and MRI. We also actively incorporate metabolic approaches to prevent the onset and recurrence of coronary artery disease, aiming to provide fundamental therapy against the accumulation of arteriosclerotic risk factors represented by metabolic syndrome. In collaboration with the Department of Cardiovascular Surgery, we have performed more than 1000 cases of transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) for aortic stenosis. We also perform various catheter interventions for structural heart diseases, including percutaneous transluminal septal myocardial ablation (PTSMA) for obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and catheter therapy for mitral valve regurgitation (MitraClip) started in 2018, and transcatheter closure of atrial septal defect (ASD) started in 2019. In addition, we started transcatheter patent foramen ovale (PFO) closure in 2021. In collaboration with the Department of Neurology and Cerebrovascular Disease, the Brain Heart Team treats patients with PFO and paradoxical embolism.

Considerations in referring your patients to Cardiovascular Medicine

We widely accept first-visit patients. To improve our services, such as shortening waiting time, we set up an outpatient clinic for first-visit patients every day. We are also ready to accept direct referrals to each specialized outpatient clinic, such as ischemia heart disease, SHD, pulmonary hypertension, lipids, congenital heart disease, etc. For details, please refer to the latest schedule of outpatient physicians.