Alta Bates Summit Cardiovascular Center

The Alta Bates Summit Cardiovascular Center of Excellence is a nationally recognized heart center, providing top-rated cardiac care by a team of heart doctors and cardiac specialists. The program offers diagnostic and treatment techniques, using state-of-the-art technology which gives our patients personalized care and a close partnership with our physicians. We deliver outcomes that meet or exceed national benchmarks.

We are a California leader in developing minimally invasive heart surgery. Alta Bates Summit Medical Center was the first center on the West Coast and the second center in the United States to use minimally invasive vein harvesting during coronary artery bypass surgery. Since then, we’ve expanded our minimally invasive techniques to include valve repair and replacement known as port access valve surgery, and we are a teaching center for this technique.

Our stable, long-term, experienced team consisting of surgeons, anesthesiologists, intensivists and other specialty physicians, nurses and ancillary staff gives our patients the best hope for excellent outcomes.

Our TAVR program has successfully enabled us to treat high-risk, inoperable patients with symptomatic severe calcific-degenerative aortic valve stenosis. TAVR reduces the level of invasiveness down to the equivalent of a heart catheterization procedure. Our TAVR outcomes meet or exceed national benchmarks, with the majority of our patients discharged home within two or three days. The procedure can be performed in most patients without general anesthesia, which helps contribute to a rapid recovery and reduced risk.