San Francisco says goodbye to Dr. Natale

Met with Dr. Andrea Natale today at the California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco. This is Dr. Natale's final week in San Francisco. For people in California, the next closest locations are Thousand Oaks (LA) and LaJolla (SD). Dr. Natale had been there since 2008. My PVI will be scheduled in LA next month. And it would of been a 20 minute drive for me if I had needed him last year as I am a native San Franciscan. But he obviously will be worth the longer drive.

Teddy

Yes Teddy,

It is most certainly well worth the drive south for your ablation with Dr Natale! I’ve just returned from last week in Austin attending the always highly interesting and informative EP Live 2018 Conference, sponsored by Dr Natale and his staff at St Davids and held every two years to teach both long time EPs as well as younger EPs in the making who are still in their Fellowship training that travel from all parts of the globe for this concentrated two days of intensive advanced training via live cases done in St Davids 4 state of the art EP Labs and one Hybrid EP/Surgical Lab. The focus is purely on advanced techniques s d procedures the majority of EPs simply are not exposed to during a typical EP Clinical EP Fellowship program.

More later on EP Live.

Shannon

I said goodbye to Dr. Natale today, and to Salwa. Today we talked about the second TEE I had for the Watchman. In the future I will drive to LA or fly to Austin but presently I'm in good health. A few ectopics but nothing out of the ordinary. Since 2012, 3 ablations and one Watchman and all is well. Salwa helped me a few times when I was in misery and she is awesome as well. I told Dr. Natale that if I never see him again I love him and will always think of him but if I need him I will call. Shannon, thank you for your help and your calls. You are very special.

Very nice note Mike and great to hear you are doing so well!!

It’s great to see Salwa is coming to Austin now too to direct the staff there as well. We saw each other and caught up and as well with Dr Natale last week in Austin at the EP Live 2018 Conference for some fun times including a very nice 6 course Italian dinner with Dr Natale and about 25 other EPs at a fancy Italian restaurant far across Austin from the St Davids campus on Thursday night first night of the conference. EP Live is held every two years in Austin and is one of my very favorite of all EP conferences.

Cheers!
Shannon

It's been quite a long time since I last posted. But I was doing a walk down memory lane tonight about my ablation and this thread caught my eye. Just over four years ago I had my Natale ablation in San Francisco. My heart has been beating so perfectly since my ablation, it's like I never had the nine years of chronic nightmarish a-fib. I'm off of everything medication wise, except the Xarelto remains. Like a good many of us here, to totally quell all the demons Dr. Natale had to pull out all the stops. Of course, it's a small trade off for about a bazillion percent improvement in my life.

Anyway, Dr. Natale's new digs in Thousand Oaks are about a ten minute drive from my home! lol. What's the chance of that? Anyway, Thousand Oaks is a very nice place, very safe. It's in the very far flung suburbs of Los Angeles, so far out that's it's actually in the next county of Ventura. Anyone that goes there will be pleased with the location.

Onewaypockets;:

So for 4 years you have been on Xaralto, may I ask why, shouldn't undergoing an ablation and you no longer get AF that you wouldn't need a blood thinner?

Liz

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Elizabeth
So for 4 years you have been on Xaralto, may I ask why, shouldn't undergoing an ablation and you no longer get AF that you wouldn't need a blood thinner?

Not necessarily. A high CHADS score or inadequate blood flow in the left atrial appendage mean you have to remain on anticoagulants.

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Elizabeth
Onewaypockets;:

So for 4 years you have been on Xaralto, may I ask why, shouldn't undergoing an ablation and you no longer get AF that you wouldn't need a blood thinner?

Liz

Hi Elizabeth, Yes, normally some patients can come off Xarelto or Eliquis. In my case, Dr. Natale had to do what Shannon calls Dr. Natale's "Index Ablation". I had a very long history of a-fib, nine years of progressively worse a-fib. The Sotalol was not very effective for me anymore. My chest felt like two or three strong fish hammering away.

For good reason Dr. Natale scheduled my ablation second of the day. To my knowledge most days he has a first and a second, I believe he knew I was a mess from my history. Indeed, my ablation went very long for a Dr. Natale ablation, way over four hours. He ablated just about everything that could be toasted that day, And the final bit to squelch the final bit of a-fib was a complete go around of my left atrial appendage. Six months after my ablation they did a measurement of my flow around the left appendage, it's not even close to being able to come off of the Xarelto.

But that said, I'm wildly happy to be back in sinus, 100% normal beats all the time, from the moment I woke up and now even four years later. Dr. Natale and his staff were totally upfront about the left atrial appendage issue that I might have when they reviewed my case. I did my DD surrounding Dr. Natale for several years before my ablation, and gave myself totally over to the process, I was stress free being led to the cath. lab that day. My life was such a mess it couldn't get worse that it was. I was reborn that day.