Week 4 & 5:

       Aside from working on my research project, I spent some time in the catheterization lab, observing radiofrequency ablation procedure. The patients who were treated to this procedure have some forms of arrhythmia, which is the irregular heart beating, caused by some abnormal tissues that generates abnormal signals. The purpose of the ablation procedure is then to locate these tissues and then kill the signals by either damage the abnormal tissues or isolate their signals. Radiofrequency ablation is also a catheter based procedure, but far more complicated. 

       During the procedure, instead of inserting one catheter, multiple catheters, each has different function, were inserted. One of the catheter was used to perform the electro anatomic mapping of the internal shapes of the heart. The resulting map was used to guide the whole ablation procedure. Ultrasound was also used for guiding the procedure, and the ultrasound images were captured through one of the catheter from inside of the heart. There were also catheters specials in capturing electric signals in the heart, and these catheters were used to identify the source of the abnormal signals before the ablation. The last catheter was the ablation catheter which is able to produce radiofrequencies to contact tissues to effectively burn those tissues, so that no signals will be produced by those damaged tissues, and no signals can travel across them as well. For the procedures that I observed, the source of the abnormal signals all came from one of the veins. So the goals of the procedures were to burn the tissues connecting the veins and the heart, so the signals from the veins will not be able to travel to the heart. Once the desired tissues are burnt, the operators used one catheter to send a signal from the vein, and use another catheter to see if that signal is received in the heart. If no signal was received in the heart, then the ablation was considered as success.