Cardiac catheterization (also called angiogram) provides diagnostic images of the heart's arteries to see how the blood is flowing through the heart. This procedure is used to evaluate patients for surgery and to perform non-surgical treatments.
Some of our locations also offer radial artery catheterization. During most traditional diagnostic cardiac catheterization procedures, a cardiologist uses the femoral artery in the leg as the entry point for a catheter tube, which is guided through the body's arteries to the heart. The radial artery approach allows a cardiologist to insert the catheter through the radial artery in the wrist.
Radial artery catheterization offers patients several benefits:
- - Less bleeding, meaning less chance of needing a blood transfusion
- - Less risk of nerve trauma
- - Lower rates of complication
- - Shorter recovery/more comfortable (patients can move around immediately after the procedure rather than having to stay in bed for several hours)