Panasonic Healthcare Group and CardioNexus Corp recently announced that they will supply Panasonic CardioHealth Stations to the Methodist Willowbrook Hospital in order to help them detect early heart disease. The Methodist Willowbrook Hospital is a 251-bed, nonprofit, tertiary care hospital, that forms a part of The Methodist Hospital System.

Panasonic's CardioHealth Station continues has a strong reputation in the medical community as doctors have realized that this is one of the safest ways to use technology and detect disease at an early stage thereby reducing long-term healthcare costs of the patient.

In a release, Beryl Ramsey, CEO of Methodist Willowbrook Hospital said, "With the addition of the Panasonic CardioHealth Station, our campus has become the first hospital in Houston, Texas to implement this revolutionary medical technology. The CardioHealth Station and its automated features will empower our physicians to better assess our patient's cardiovascular risk at an early stage."

The CardioHealth Station is has been specifically designed to enable medical professionals make quick and strong assessments of cardiovascular health. The CardioHealth Station has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use in the automated acquisition of carotid intima-media thickness data and risk assessment.

The CardioHealth Station comes with an inbuilt portable ultrasound system that has been optimized to conduct non-invasive examinations of the peripheral vessels. It has the ability to provide an automated measurement of the intima-media thickness (IMT) of peripheral arteries like the common carotid, while enabling the user to scan for arterial plaques in B-mode imaging.  

Steven Lynum, Director of Clinical Products, Panasonic Healthcare Group said, "We are pleased to provide Methodist Willowbrook Hospital with the revolutionary technology of the Panasonic CardioHealth Station as they strive to better detect and treat cardiovascular disease. The American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology recently updated the guidelines for the screening of asymptomatic patients with intermediate risk, creating awareness for the necessity to reduce healthcare costs through prevention. Panasonic is proud to continue to play a part in the national effort for the prevention of cardiovascular disease by providing Doctors with important diagnostic tools such as the CardioHealth Station."