Summing the Parts 4385

COVER STORY

The technologies developed by Stereotaxis and its partner companies work together to improve current procedures in vascular catheterization and electrophysiology labs. The system improves on the current standard of care in interventional medicine in several important ways, including removing the physician from the x-ray field and reducing patient exposure to radiation; enabling automated performance of arrhythmia treatments and other vascular interventions with enhanced efficiency, precision, and safety; and supporting practice growth by lowering overall treatment costs. The company's system includes the following key components.

Stereotaxis magnetic navigation system. Uses a magnetic field to control the distal tip of a catheter or guidewire. The physician maintains precise navigational control of the tip regardless of how far it travels or how many turns it executes to reach the heart.

Cardiodrive catheter advancement system. Remotely advances and retracts magnetically guided catheters and guidewires within the patient, eliminating the need to manually push, twist, or pull on the interventional device. The computer-controlled advancer can achieve milli-meter adjustments in the catheter position.

Magnetic GentleTouch catheters. Conventional catheters must be stiff so that they can be steered from their back end. By contrast, GentleTouch catheters are magnetically guided and designed to be extremely soft and flexible, thereby reducing the risk of perforation or damage to heart tissue or vessel walls.

Cronus, Assert, and Titan guidewires. These magnetically enabled guidewires are used to introduce and place over-the-wire therapeutic devices such as biventricular pacing leads used for cardiac resynchronization therapy, or stents used in percutaneous coronary intervention.

Odyssey network solutions. During a procedure, Odyssey consolidates multiple sources of diagnostic and imaging information into a single, manageable format, integrating them with Navigant, a user interface that enables the physician to control the procedure from a remote location. Odyssey's networked capability enables clinicians to share information easily within a hospital or from hospital to hospital, expanding the number of locations from which technical and clinical support and training can take place.

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