At the Clinic for Cardiac Surgery of the Clinical Center of the University of Sarajevo, a heart operation was performed using the 3D endoscopic technique. The operation was performed by Professor Dr. Nermir Granov, Director of the Surgical Discipline of the KCUS, a pioneer of minimally invasive cardiac surgery in our country. With the aim of strengthening international cooperation and exchanging professional experiences, a team of doctors from Houston attended the operation.
The technique of minimally invasive surgery is something that, thanks to Dr. Nermir Granov and his team of people, is increasingly being applied in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The visit of eminent world doctors in this field to the Clinical Center of the University of Sarajevo is the result of previously established cooperation with Dr. Granov, who during his visit to Houston shared his knowledge and experience in a lecture on the topic of “endoscopic mitral valve surgery – new strategies.”
dr. MAHESH RAMCHANDANI, Houston Heart Center: “We perform high-quality surgeries through very small incisions that lead to faster patient recovery. We, myself in Houston and a colleague in Oman, perform minimally invasive surgical techniques, we don’t have to open the sternum, but Professor Granov has taken it to a higher level. He uses endoscopes to improve visualization. The incisions have become even smaller. We are really very impressed with that and we came here to learn these techniques.”
3D technology enables and helps in better access during surgery, especially complex surgeries. New strategies for endoscopic mitral valve surgery will improve the practice in Houston.
Dr. QASIM AL ABRI, National Heart Center, Oman: “The next step is to bring this to Houston and start doing these surgeries, to train the team to do them. And the third step is to do what Dr. Granov is doing now, to teach teams in other hospitals this technology and these techniques and to continue to do this around the world and help other patients and hospitals do surgeries like these.”
The exchange of new modern techniques and technologies, approaches, is of utmost importance for patients around the world, in order to provide them with the best and highest quality care.
Dr. QASIM AL ABRI, National Heart Center, Oman: “That’s why I think it’s the most important part of our specialty, not only to cure patients, but to advance the field and provide the best solutions for our patients.”
Dr. Ramchandani highlights his collaboration with the best cardiac surgeon of the 20th century, who operated on 60,000 people during his career and made great achievements in the field of cardiac surgery, Michael DeBeckie until the early 1990s. Today, this world-renowned expert would envy the techniques used in Sarajevo.
Dr. MAHESH RAMCHANDANI, Houston Heart Center: “I think you would be impressed by what you would see in Sarajevo, how Professor Granov and his team work. And it’s really important how focused he is on the team and how he takes care of them because he understands that it’s never just one person. Granov does a great job of respecting all members of his team so that they see that they are really important too.”
DeBeckie argued that health does not depend only on modern medicine, but also on everyday habits that keep the heart healthy. Dr. Granov now performs more than 80 percent of surgical procedures endoscopically.
