Last fall, Tom McElderry, MD, a cardiovascular physician practicing at UAB, became the first surgeon in the United States to use the new IntellaTip MiFi™ XP catheter during an electrophysiological procedure. McElderry had worked with Boston Scientific for five years to develop the sensor technology for the IntellaTip catheter, which was approved by the FDA in August for the treatment of atrial flutter, an arrhythmia that affects nearly one million people in the United States.
Catheter ablation, a procedure in which localized electrical energy is delivered into the heart tissue in order to restore the continuous normal rhythm, has become a first-line treatment approach for patients with certain kinds of irregular heartbeats.
IntellaTip MiFi™ XP is engineered to deliver highly localized electrical information in real time. An innovative set of super-sensitive recording electrodes in the sensor at the tip of the new catheter provide electrograms of the heart with a higher resolution than any other ablation catheter, which gives electrophysiology physicians the ability to better locate diseased heart tissue.
The hope is that with improved imaging, ablation procedures can be performed with greater precision and the amount of energy delivered to the target tissue can be reduced.
“The catheter helps physicians pinpoint the areas for therapy delivery, which helps make a more precise diagnosis and treatment of rhythm atrial flutter,” said McElderry, who is an associate professor of medicine and section chief of Electrophysiology in the UAB Division of Cardiovascular Disease. “It allows you to perform a surgical strike versus killing healthy tissue unnecessarily.
McElderry, who consults with BioSense Webster Inc. and St. Jude Medical in addition to Boston Scientific, conducted preclinical lab work with the IntellaTip MiFi™ XP catheter. No clinical testing was required because the device is a modification of a previous catheter.
He believes that use of the IntellaTip MiFi™ XP will lead to new opportunities of investigation. "In my experience with this technology, it proved especially useful in identifying areas of interest for diagnosis and ablation,” he says. “This level of high resolution electrogram is something we have never seen before and I believe it will open a whole new array of possibilities in electrophysiological procedures.”
In addition, McElderry says that even more significant catheter improvements are being developed that will address complex arrhythmias in the left atrium and left ventricle. “While the new catheter is helpful, it’s just a small step forward in comparison to what’s coming. We’re working on a catheter that will be able to squirt water to break up blood clots,” he says.
In addition to the IntellaTip MiFi™ XP catheter, Boston Scientific received 510(k) clearance of its Zurpaz™ 8.5F steerable sheath that is designed to gain access to the heart, facilitating placement of catheters for use in a variety of procedures including treatment of atrial flutter, atrial fibrillation and ventricular tachycardia.
McElderry, who has treated dozens of patients with the IntellaTip since the catheter was given FDA clearance, believes that the new catheter and sheath is a major improvement for surgeons and their patients. “This new technology promises to improve quality of life for tachycardia patients,” McElderry says. “It’s a diagnostic improvement making the catheter a more valuable tool when performing ablation.”
