storytime
July 02, 1999 05:35
Life Got Much Better After EECP Treatment
WESTBURY, N.Y., July 2 /PRNewswire/ -- LeRoy Hamilton had a heart attack about twenty years ago. After that his life became one of coping with severe illness. Every year he would end up in the hospital at least once. He had angioplasty four times, he suffered a stroke that paralyzed his left side, and he continually struggled with high blood pressure.
He worked hard and was able to recover almost completely from the stroke but he was confined to his home due to debilitating angina pain which required that he take nitroglycerin three or four times a day. To cross a room he had to walk from chair to chair, his legs ached all the time and he needed to be on oxygen most of the time. His father had died of a heart attack at the age of seventy-two so LeRoy felt his time was limited.
Two years ago, at the age of 73, LeRoy was referred for EECP at the Heart-Lung Center in Hawthorne, NJ. EECP is a noninvasive, outpatient treatment for angina. It involves the use of pressure cuffs which are wrapped around the legs and sequentially inflated to push blood toward the heart. When LeRoy heard about the treatment he says "he didn't really believe in it at first". He received seven weeks of treatment, five days a week. LeRoy states, "Life got so much better after the treatment".
These days, LeRoy is out of the house a great deal. As a deacon in his church he regularly visits his fellow church members when they are sick or in the hospital. When people need help getting to doctors' appointments, medical treatments, to the grocery store or to the bank, LeRoy drives them anywhere they need to go. LeRoy and his wife are also raising their three teenaged grandchildren, so his day starts at 7:30 a.m. every morning driving the grandchildren and their friends to two different schools. He then picks them all up and drives them home at the end of the day. Any of the children's friends who need a ride know that he is ready and willing.
As an interesting sideline, LeRoy has also lost about sixteen pounds. LeRoy was about 222 pounds when he started the EECP treatments. His daily treatments were at 1:00 p.m. LeRoy was used to eating three big meals a day. He was asked not to eat lunch before the treatments so that his stomach would not be heavy or full for the treatments. This meant that LeRoy didn't eat his lunch until about 2:30 p.m. each day. After a large late lunch LeRoy found he wasn't very hungry at dinner time so he would just have something light. After seven weeks of treatments, with just this change, he had lost about eight pounds. LeRoy then decided to continue on this eating schedule which had become comfortable for him. He is now down to about 206 pounds.
The other change in his life, of course, is his daily activity. He is now always on the move. Even in visiting the sick, there is a lot of walking involved because his local medical center is fairly large. LeRoy finds his activities very manageable. He hasn't had to use nitroglycerin for angina pain since his treatment. When he does very occasionally have some chest pain it is very minor. His blood pressure stays within range now and his cholesterol counts are good.
LeRoy states that he found the EECP treatments very tolerable and that the nurses were "very kind and sweet." He is grateful that he can now be useful and that it is a great blessing to be able to get out and offer assistance and comfort to others who are less fortunate than him.
Vasomedical, Inc. (Nasdaq: VASO) (www.vasomedical.com) is primarily engaged in designing, manufacturing, marketing and supporting external counterpulsation systems based on the Company's proprietary technology. EECP(R) is a registered trademark for Vasomedical. This system is now in use at major medical centers, including those affiliated with Columbia- Presbyterian Medical Center, University of Pittsburgh, University of California San Diego, University of California San Francisco and the University of Virginia, as well as The Miami Heart Institute and The Mayo Clinic. The Company provides hospitals, clinics and private medical practices EECP(R) equipment, treatment guidance and a staff training and maintenance program to ensure optimal patient outcomes.
Except for the historical information contained in this news release, the matters discussed are forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. When used in this release, words such as "anticipate," "believe," "estimate," "expect," "intend," and similar expressions, as they relate to the company and its management, identify forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements are based on the beliefs of the Company's management, as well as assumptions made by, and information currently available to, the Company's management. Among the factors that could cause actual results to differ materially are the following: the effect of business and economic conditions; the impact of competitive products and pricing; capacity and supply constraints or difficulties; product development, commercialization or technological difficulties; the regulatory, reimbursement and trade environment; and the risk factors reported from time to time in the Company's SEC reports. The Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements as a result of future events or developments.
SOURCE Vasomedical, Inc.
/CONTACT: Sharon Klein or Louise Pangborn, 215-233-5086 or 215-836-0363, for Vasomedical/
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