September 5, 2018
Page 5
Reducing the Risk of Stroke
Legacy hits
milestone with
‘Watchman’
implant
A northeast Portland moth-
er and grandmother has be-
come the 200th patient at
Legacy Emanuel Medical
Center to receive a one-time
procedure that can reduce the
risk of stroke in people with
non-valvular atrial fibrillation
(A-Fib).
The patient, Ruth Jeffer-
son-Simon, 86, wants everyone
to know that she “feels good.”
Legacy Emanuel was the
first in Oregon to offer the
Watchman device in 2015,
and today the local hospital is
in the top 10 of hospitals in the
U.S. for implanting the medi-
cal product.
According to Dr. Amish De-
sai, Legacy’s structural heart
medical director, patients who
benefit from a Watchman are
those with A-Fib who may ex-
perience bleeding complica-
tions from blood thinners and
want an alternative to these
medications.
Like most patients with
A-Fib, Jefferson-Simon was
put on blood thinners.
“I took blood thinners for
years, which gave me bad GI
bleeds,” she said.
Her lifestyle was compro-
mised by her heart problems
and the bleeding complica-
tions often left her short of
breath. Soon day-to-day tasks
became challenging. She still
had to cook and care for her
husband of 30 years who has
dementia. There was very lit-
tle energy left for her passion,
fishing.
“I’m a good fisherman,” she
said with a smile. “I can beat
everybody catching bass, but
they still want to challenge
me.”
She keeps her fishing pole
and tackle box ready and has
gone to her favorite fishing
hole several times since get-
ting her Watchman.
The medical device is a
one-time procedure and a per-
manent implant that closes off
a part of the heart where blood
clots commonly form.
“The Watchman device is a
very low risk, minimally inva-
doctor makes a small incision
in the upper leg and a narrow
tube is inserted. The doctor
guides the Watchman through
the tube, into the patient’s left
atrial appendage. The proce-
dure is done under general
anesthesia and typically takes
about an hour. Patients like Jef-
ferson-Simon typically stay in
the hospital 1-2 nights and go
home. They remain on blood
thinners 45-days after the pro-
cedure until the Watchman is
permanently closed off.
Jefferson-Simon
wasn’t
afraid of getting the proce-
dure; she was a born risk-tak-
er. She grew up in a family of
boys in Eldorado, AR. At age
10, her older brothers taught
her how to drive.
She later moved to San Di-
ego in the early 1960s, where
Jefferson-Simon rode a Harley
Davidson and traveled with a
Ruth Jefferson-Simon, 86, is the 200th patient to receive a Watchman device at Legacy
motorcycle club up and down
Emanuel Medical Center for patients with non-valvular artial fibrillation (A-Fib). She wants
the West Coast.
everyone to know that she “feels good.”
“Those were the good old
sive treatment that greatly re- thinners, it addresses the prob-
The Watchman is about the days,” she laughed. “I just
duces their stroke risk. Instead lem at its source,” said Dr. De- size of a quarter and it doesn’t want to ride one more time but
of putting patients on blood sai.
require open-heart surgery. The this time, on the back.”