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How we studied was more important than what we studied. It’s the preparation for how to study, how to learn. In our field, you can’t be static. - Dr. Matthew Sackett ’90, P’18
Having been an early adopter of technology in the field of cardiac electrophysiology (heart rhythm disorders), Dr. Matthew Sackett ’90, P’18 practices medicine with the intention that it can — and should — evolve.
He felt drawn to the emerging field as a fourth-year medical student at the University of Virginia, and he continues to research and seek out the latest technological advances for his patients as director of cardiac electrophysiology at the Centra Heart & Vascular Institute in his hometown of Lynchburg, Virginia.
“There are so many new tools and devices each year that make what we do better, safer, faster,” he says.
When Sackett joined the practice in 2002, its doctors were performing about 12 ablations for atrial fibrillation (irregular heartbeats) a year. In the past, ablations were done with radio frequency, which delivers heat at the end of a catheter to create a scar where the doctor wants to kill an arrhythmia. As technology has become progressively faster and better, Sackett and his team of five electrophysiologists and 35 cardiologists have been able to treat patients on a larger scale. In the last year, they performed 750 ablations for atrial fibrillation, and new technology they implemented in the fall of 2024, called pulse field ablation, which delivers an electrical pulse to selectively kill tissue, will increase those numbers even further.
“It’s going to revolutionize how many procedures we can do in a day and how many patients we can treat,” Sackett says.
Sackett and his team at Centra are also at the forefront of an innovative device designed to help patients with congestive heart failure. The Integra D device, made by Impulse Dynamics, combines a new therapy called cardiac contractility modulation (CCM) therapy with an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD). CCM therapy, which is new as of the last few years, can offer symptom improvement to patients who previously did not have other options. Traditionally, people with congestive heart failure have required separate CCM and ICD devices to prevent sudden cardiac death and to enhance cardiovascular function. The new device combines both functions into one rechargeable unit that patients can charge themselves once a week, much the same way you would an iPad. Previous devices required replacement every six to 10 years, and the Integra D models are projected to last 20 years, which limits the number of surgeries a patient needs over time.
Centra implanted the first Integra D device into a patient in the Commonwealth of Virginia in April 2024. As of June, fewer than 50 people worldwide had received the device, and Centra is among the 75 cardiovascular centers around the world participating in the clinical trial, which requires a two-year follow-up period to gather comprehensive patient data before ultimately seeking FDA approval.
“We take care of the same patients, but we take care of them in a much different way than we did 10 years ago,” Sackett says. He also serves as director of electrophysiology at Madaktari Africa, an NGO started by a neurosurgeon doing mission work in Tanzania. Madaktari operates on a train-forward model so that visiting doctors and surgeons from around the world visit Tanzania for weeks at a time to share their knowledge with local medical personnel. In 2010, Centra partnered with other institutions globally to build the first public cardiac catheterization lab in Tanzania, home to 67 million people. More recently, visiting doctors have helped train Tanzanian medical staff on pacemaker and defibrillator implants and are now focusing on cardiac ablation.
Sackett, a chemistry major, says Washington and Lee University’s Honor System and Speaking Tradition are principles that “carry forward into life.” He says W&L’s professors prepared him well for medical school beyond the subject matters taught.
“How we studied was more important than what we studied,” he says. “It’s the preparation for how to study, how to learn. In our field, you can’t be static.”
This article first appeared in the Fall/Winter 2024 issue of W&L: The Washington and Lee Magazine. Contact us at magazine@wlu.edu.