Heart Ablation

Heart arrhythmias occur when cells in your heart muscle send out faulty electrical signals. Some of these issues can increase your risk for strokes and heart failure. Heart rhythm specialists (electrophysiologists) with The Heart Group of Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health are national leaders in performing fluoroless (radiation-free) heart ablation procedures to treat arrhythmias.

What Is a Fluoroless (Radiation-Free) Heart Ablation?

Heart ablation most commonly uses heat (radiofrequency) to destroy the sections of heart tissue sending erratic electric signals. Ablations take place through catheters (thin, flexible tubes) threaded through a blood vessel to your heart. Our doctors perform catheter ablations in the Lancaster region’s only Electrophysiology (EP) Clinic. We don’t open your chest.

Standard heart ablations require the use of X-rays and radiation to place the catheters and perform the ablation. Our team of electrophysiologists have advanced training using the latest technology to perform heart ablations without X-ray. Since 2019, Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health doctors have exclusively used high-resolution ultrasound and a 3D mapping system to perform zero-X-ray heart ablations.

Benefits of Fluoroless Heart Ablations

This radiation-free approach to heart ablations is as effective as those that use X-rays. But fluoroless heart ablations are safer because there’s no radiation exposure.

The 3D heart mapping system enables our doctors to more precisely pinpoint and treat the heart tissue where an arrhythmia originates. It also allows us to create new cardiac maps (a type of EP study) after each ablation to gauge treatment success in real time. With this technology, we effectively treat all arrhythmia-causing areas during one procedure.

Why You Might Need a Zero-Fluoroscopy Heart Ablation

Our doctors use fluoroless catheter ablations to treat fast heart rates caused by:

• Atrial fibrillation (A-Fib)
• Atrial flutter
• Supraventricular tachycardia
• Premature ventricular contractions (PVCs)/ventricular tachycardias

Fluoroless Heart Ablations: The Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health Advantage

The Heart & Vascular Institute at Lancaster General Health is one of only a few programs in the country exclusively performing radiation-free heart ablations. Our cardiac ablation team has years of experience using this advanced method. We safely perform hundreds of fluoroless catheter ablations every year.

You also benefit from:

• Surgical A-Fib treatments: A-Fib that occurs with other heart problems may require an advanced ablation surgery called the Maze procedure. Our heart surgeons expertly perform this cardiothoracic surgery in one of the Lancaster region’s only hybrid operating rooms (OR). This advanced surgical suite allows our team of heart doctors to collaborate on open-chest and catheter-based procedures when necessary.
• Comprehensive arrhythmia treatments: If an ablation isn’t right for you, we offer a full range of arrhythmia treatments. You may benefit from a heart rhythm device like a pacemaker, leadless pacemaker or implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD). Our doctors also specialize in implanting the WATCHMAN™ device to lower your stroke risk when you have A-Fib.
• Access to research and new therapies: We’re actively involved in heart and vascular clinical trials and research to improve the care of people experiencing arrhythmias. You may be able to try promising new therapies still in development. We’re also part of a national database reviewing the safety and efficacy of fluoroless heart ablations.

Contact Us

To learn more about our EP Clinic and fluoroless heart ablation, call 717-544-8300.