Paragould, AR – JonesboroRightNow.com – Officials with St. Bernards unveiled a new heart and vascular clinic and diagnostic center at Paragould Medical Park on Thursday.
The clinic offers various noninvasive tests, including echocardiograms, stress testing, and vascular studies. It will also feature a heart catheterization lab, allowing specialists to perform minimally invasive procedures to treat blood flow issues. It is scheduled to be completed later in the spring.
Officials said the facility is the only outpatient hybrid, cardiac, vascular, and EP lab in Northeast Arkansas. With its opening, patients in need of these types of treatment will no longer need to travel to Jonesboro.
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“The cool thing about this lab is it gives the patients access to procedures for which they would normally drive to Jonesboro for. It gives them an opportunity to have access to providers that they would normally only see in Jonesboro,” Connie Hill, vice president of HeartCare, Emergency and Perioperative Services, told JRN.
The facility is also in communication with the St. Bernards’ Heart and Vascular Clinic in Jonesboro, allowing physicians to collaborate.
Dr. Ammar Hallak is an interventional cardiologist who has lived and practiced in Paragould since 2000. He said the lab and clinic will allow for a variety of procedures to be performed and diagnoses to be made.
“[The catheterization lab] will let us diagnose and treat heart disease, find out if there’s a blockage there and try to fix that for the patient,” he said during Thursday’s ceremony. “The other edition that we had is the cardiac CAT scanner that we added recently; this is the only one here in Greene County. [It] lets us diagnose heart disease.”
The clinic is located in Paragould Medical Park, which houses various medical services. For St. Bernards, these services include primary and urgent care services, as well as cancer, heart, urology, and pregnancy care. The facility is located at 4000 Linwood Drive.
“St. Bernards is very proud to be able to serve the citizens of Paragould and Greene County, as we have for many years, and we will continue to grow,” said Kevin Hawley, outreach and development coordinator for the Heart and Vascular Program. “We’ll take care of the patients right here at home.”
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