This is a story that aired on OETA Public Television's The Oklahoma News Report in Tulsa Oklahoma as reported by Angela Rosecrans and photojournalist Tim Carson. For more information or to contact us, please go to www.oeta.tv

The Verbatim script follows below....

"everything go smoothly this morning? Well they put lots of stuff on me and stuck a hole in me so I guess we're ready to go. Perfect.



MY O-E-T-A COLLEGUE, CATHY TATOM, IS READY TO FINALLY GET THE PROCEDURE SHE WISHED HAD BEEN DONE TWENTY YEARS AGO.


CATHY TATOM "nervous but happy to know I'm not gonna have to deal with it much longer once they're done with the surgery, I'm done."



TATOM WAS BORN WITH A HEART CONDITION CALLED



(SURPA- VENN- TRICK-YOU-LURE ---- TRAWK-IH-CARD-EE-UH) SUPRAVENTRICULAR TACHYCARDIA

OR SVT FOR SHORT.

IT CAUSES HER HEART TO BEAT WAY TOO RAPIDLY ON MOST DAYS.

AND DURING BAD EPISODES OF SVT- SHE FAINTS AND HAS EVEN ENDED UP BEING RUSHED TO THE HOSPITAL ON SEVERAL OCCASSIONS.

BUT FOR YEARS SHE WAS TOLD BY HER DOCTORS IT WAS NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT.



CATHY TATOM "it was either you're a little high strung or stressed or you've had too much caffeine



TODAY, SHE HAS A CARDIOLOGIST THAT KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT S-V-T IS.
Dr. David Sandler people can have a variety of different symptoms that may or may not lead to the proper diagnosis initially there's been a study shown that 50% of primary care physicians will diagnose- usually a woman- with an anxiety disorder or panic attacks rather than what they really have which is an arithmea causing their symptoms."



DR. DAVID A. SANDLER SPECIALIZES IN ELECTRO-PHYSIOLOGY- BASICALLY AN ELECTRICIAN FOR HEARTS.

TODAY, HE'S PERFORMING WHAT IS CALLED A CATHER-ABLATION FOR A COMPLETE CURE OF TATOM'S SYMPTOMS .



"what I'm doing now is putting three cathiters into the vein in her leg."



NOW THAT HE'S IN THERE HE CAN STIMULATE HER HEART AND DETERMINE WHICH TYPE OF SVT SHE HAS-- FIND THE FAULTY CIRCUIT AND GET RID OF IT.



"so she has the extra pathway near the normal circuitry of her own heart this is by far the most common one."



DOCTOR SADLER SAYS THERE IS AN ESTIMATED 2 MILLION AMERICANS WHO SUFFER FROM SVT.

HE SAYS ONCE A PATIENT HAS BEEN TO AN E-R OR HAS NEEDED MEDICATION FOR THIS CONDITION-- THEY SHOULD CERTAINLY BE CONSIDERED FOR THIS PROCEDURE... WHICH TODAY WAS A SUCCESS.



Dr. David Sandler "we were able to ablate the abnormal pathway and we've demonstrated that it's not there anymore now we're just going to wait about 30 minutes and make sure that it doesn't come back and if it doesn't come back she has a one percent or less chance of ever having her arithmia ever again so we're very happy."



TATOM SHARED HER STORY SO OTHERS WITH SIMILAR SYMPTOMS MIGHT INVESTIGATE WHETHER THIS TREATMENT WOULD BE RIGHT FOR THEM.

IN TULSA, ANGELA ROSECRANS, THE OKLAHOMA NEWS REPORT.