Bill to Expand Access to Certain Cardiac Procedures Passes the Senate

TRENTON – A bill that would seek to expand the number of facilities in New Jersey that are authorized to perform certain cardiac interventions, including diagnostic cardiac catheterization, primary angioplasty, and elective angioplasty services, passed the full Senate today. The bill would allow certain facilities outside cardiac surgery centers to perform these procedures, in an effort to provide greater access to high-quality cardiovascular care for patients throughout New Jersey.

The bill, sponsored by Senator Joseph Vitale, Senator Vin Gopal and Senator Paul Sarlo, would provide that a hospital that is not a licensed cardiac surgery center may apply to the Commissioner of Health to attain licensure to perform these procedures.

The bill comes in part as response to studies that have found that angioplasty, or percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), a procedure used to widen clogged arteries, and help to improve blood flow, when performed at hospitals without on-site cardiac surgery was non-inferior to PCI performed at hospitals with on-site cardiac surgery.

“Life-saving cardiac procedures have been modernized and made far safer over the last decade, so it is only fair and pragmatic for those seeking these critical surgeries to have every opportunity to access them with the greatest convenience possible,” said Senator Vitale (D-Middlesex).

The bill is based on a recent history of cardiovascular care, and recent studies that have concluded that these procedures can safely and routinely be performed outside of licensed cardiac surgery centers, provided certain safeguards and protocols are in place. The measure aims to improve access to such procedures for individuals who may not live in close proximity to a traditional cardiac surgery center.

“Right now there are only 29 hospitals in New Jersey licensed to provide elective angioplasty. That may sound like a lot, but the problem is that most of those hospitals are clustered in only 14 counties,” said Senator Gopal (D-Monmouth). “This bill is a way to give more opportunity to more residents who might seek out these services.”

“Eleven New Jersey hospitals without on-site cardiac surgery units are now authorized to provide elective angioplasty and continue to do so,” said Senator Sarlo (D-Bergen/Passaic). “This legislation seeks to open the access to this procedure more widely, to more facilities, so that all those who seek to benefit from such surgeries and procedures are not hampered by logistical obstacles.”

A hospital applying for licensure under the bill would be required to enter into a collaboration agreement with a licensed cardiac surgery center; the agreement would be required to include written protocols for transferring patients requiring emergency cardiac surgery to the licensed cardiac surgery center within one hour of the determination of the need for such transfer, regular consultation between the hospitals on individual cases, and evidence of adequate cardiac surgery on-call backup.

A hospital issued a license to provide elective angioplasty procedures would have two years to meet the volume requirements for that license as specified in the bill.

The bill cleared the Senate by a vote of 35-1.