Beacon Hospital announces innovative new Left Bundle Branch Pacing (LBBP) treatment

• New procedure being rolled out by Dr Jonathan Lyne at Ireland’s only Heart Rhythm Centre at Beacon Hospital
• “LBBBP is one of the key future directions in fully realising the potential of conduction system pacing” – Dr Jonathan Lynne

Beacon Hospital is marking Irish Heart Month this September, by announcing a ground-breaking and innovative new cardiac pacemaker treatment, called Left bundle branch pacing (LBBP), for patients with Left bundle branch block (LBBB).

The new procedure is being pioneered in Ireland by Dr Jonathan Lyne, Director of Cardiac Electrophysiology at Beacon Hospital. Dr Lyne is a world leading expert in cardiac rhythm abnormalities and is operating at Ireland’s only Heart Rhythm Centre at Beacon Hospital.

Where an irregular heartbeat is discovered a pacemaker may be required, and in Ireland around 4,000 people get a pacemaker every year.

The new Left bundle branch pacing (LBBP) treatment involves the pacing lead being fixed deep into the left side of the intraventricular septum to allow capture of the left bundle.

It is a newer technique compared with His Bundle Pacing (HBP). Dr Jonathan Lyne points out that the positive aspects of HBP are somewhat offset by its limitations when compared to myocardial pacing such as high thresholds, small R waves, long fluoroscopy times and higher failure rates.

LBBP has had an impressive rate of accumulation of early evidence and holds promise as a method for physiological conduction system pacing that overcomes some of the fixation, threshold and sensing challenges of HBP. LBBP is also able to resynchronise patients with LBBB and is very promising for cardiac resynchronisation therapy due to its ability to correct block within the cardiac conduction system beneath the His and proximal left bundle. In published trials LBBP in patients with LBBB has resulted in very impressive improvements in left ventricular structure and function.

Dr Weijang Huang and his team from the First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou in China pioneered LBBP, have performed over 1000 cases and published widely on the topic.  Dr Jonathan Lyne spent time learning and perfecting the technique with Dr Huang in China.

Since returning Dr Lyne has carried out the procedure in over 50 patients and is the first and only cardiologist carrying out this procedure in Ireland. Dr Lyne has organised the first worldwide educational event at Beacon Hospital to teach interested colleagues how to perform this novel technique. To allow a wider audience to access the event it is being recorded and placed in webinar format to achieve a broader and wider global audience.

Dr Jonathan Lyne, Director of Cardiac Electrophysiology at Beacon Hospital said:

“The science and technology behind treatments with pacemakers is constantly evolving, and I want to always offer patients the best and most effective solutions. I strongly believe, based on evidence, that this new LBBP procedure is the way of the future for many pacemaker procedures and in particular treating heart failure and LBBB, with many benefits compared to other procedures. As growing evidence accumulates that this physiological form of conduction system pacing will translate to tangible clinical benefits for patients, this modern technique will be sought by an increasing number of patients and cardiologists. To this end, I’m happy to be able to bring the procedure to Ireland, to Beacon and to actively engage with other consultants to teach them the technique.

“I’m currently working with the medical device industry to develop adequate delivery devices and I’m planning clinical trials to follow and confirm the clinical improvements seen following LBBP.”

Michael Cullen, CEO of Beacon Hospital said:

“We’re delighted that Dr Lyne, who is an internationally recognised specialist and expert in the assessment, diagnosis and treatment of disorders related to cardiac rhythm, is performing this cutting-edge technique at Beacon Hospital. Our Heart Rhythm Centre is one of a kind in Ireland, and we’re proud to be able to offer our patients the best procedures and world-class experts, to ensure that they have the best outcomes.”