Today's surgery was the seventh time March has used the technique. March also has used the technique to repair heart valves and to do by-pass surgery. Inc. It includes a catheter-based cardiopulmonary bypass system that threads catheters through blood vessels in the groin to support blood circulation while the heart is stopped. The technique dramatically lessens trauma and shortens recovery time for patients because surgeons access the heart through small incisions in the chest, rather than getting to it by opening the chest, breaking the breast bone and spreading the ribs as has been done in traditional open-heart heart surgery.
Most patients go home within five days of the surgery, and are recovered fully within two weeks.