Maryland Heart Center

Patient Success Stories

UMMC's Heart and Heart Surgery Program ranked as one of the nation's 50 best by U.S. News & World Report's 2010 "Best Hospitals" survey.

Internet Connects Robot-Assisted Triple Bypass Heart Surgery Patient With UMMC

Sixty-seven-year-old Ronald Bress became the first person in the world to undergo robot-assisted triple bypass using an advanced, minimally invasive heart-lung machine on March 31, 2009. Bress, from Cheektowaga, New York, near Buffalo left the hospital four days later and was able to fly home just nine days later. He learned about this innovative surgical option from the UMMC Web site, as he was searching for an alternative to open heart surgery, which his doctors were recommending. Read his story below.

Dr. Bonatti, with Bress, and his wife Christine

Dr. Bonatti with patient Ronald Bress and his wife Christine.

One day while working out, 67-year-old Ronald Bress went into cardiac arrest while at a gym and was rushed to a local hospital. Doctors there told him he needed open heart surgery to bypass his blocked coronary arteries.

But Bress was seeking an alternative to open heart surgery -- he was aware of the long recovery that some of his friends had endured after traditional open heart surgery and didn’t want to take the same route.

After doing some Internet research, he learned about the innovative robot-assisted bypass approach offered at the University of Maryland Medical Center, where dozens of patients have had either single or double bypasses performed that way.

With traditional, open heart surgery, in which the sternum or chest bone is cut open to reveal the heart, three or more bypasses are routine. People who undergo such open heart surgery typically require two or three months to heal. They also face a higher risk of infection.

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By contrast, robot-assisted surgery offers several key advantages over traditional open heart procedures, including no need to split the chest open and no incisions— just three or four tiny dime-sized openings to insert robotic tools and a camera. Recovery is usually a two-to-three-week process with a quick return to normal activities, as well as reduced risk of infection and other complications.

Bress said the information on the UMMC site is what persuaded him to come to Maryland. “I was looking on the Internet and searching for newest technology for heart surgery and other ways of doing open heart surgery. Whatever I did, I found Dr. Johannes Bonatti [cardiac surgeon at the University of Maryland Medical Center and professor of surgery at the University of Maryland School of Medicine] and the da Vinci robot,” said Bress. “The page already had a [story of a] patient Dr. Bonatti had operated on [Charles Pugh], and it was so impressive to me I thought ‘there’s another miracle,” said Bress.

“The video on the site was so good. Mr. Pugh impressed me. He’s 70 years old and he came back to work right away. The Internet is so amazing that I’m in Buffalo and could still find this place. Without the Internet I don’t know what I would’ve done.”

After reading the UMMC Web site, Bress and his wife booked a flight to Baltimore in the hopes of seeing Dr. Bonatti and that the robotic-assisted heart bypass procedure would work for him.

“When I got to Baltimore, I was so impressed with Dr. Bonatti and everyone else on his team. I am grateful that I was able to avoid open heart surgery. I feel good. I’ve been doing a lot of walking around the (Baltimore) Inner Harbor since I’ve been discharged. In fact, I have even walked from the hotel back to the hospital — about 10 blocks,”said Bress just nine days after his triple bypass.

His wife, Christine, agreed:“This is an amazing place. Dr. Bonatti and his team were wonderful. They took excellent care of Ron and me, too, and they were always kind and respectful. I am so glad that he was a good candidate for this.”

Prior to his heart attack, Bress said he didn’t have any heart issues that he was aware of, but noticed that in the last year or so he got out of breath more often when he exerted himself. “I kind of took for granted I didn’t have a strong wind,” Bress said. “For a long time I never could swim more than a lap down and back without being really winded. So that might have been a sign I didn’t realize.”

Bress is very appreciative of the care he received at UMMC and hopes others can benefit from his experience. “If there’s a purpose for everything, my purpose is just that somebody else can learn what I appreciate about this surgery,” Bress said. “I would be more than happy to do it. This was all worth it.”

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