Cardiology — Wellington, Hutt and Kapiti

Cardiology outpatient clinics are in the clinical measurement unit on the ground floor of the main Wellington Regional Hospital building.

Street address:

Wellington Regional Hospital
49 Riddiford Street
Newtown
Wellington 6021

Wellington Regional Hospital — Google Maps (external link)

Cardiology

Our cardiology team provides care to people in hospital.

We also run outpatient clinics at:

• Wellington Regional Hospital
• Kenepuru Community Hospital.

When you come in for an appointment, we will assess your symptoms. This usually takes 60 to 90 minutes.

We will also:

• do some tests to determine how your heart condition is affecting you
• discuss your goals with you and a create a treatment plan.

Pacemaker and defibrillator clinics

You need to attend regular appointments if you have a pacemaker or defibrillator implanted.

This is so:

• our technologists can make sure your device is working correctly
• you can discuss any issues relating to your device.

Appointment should be every 6 to 12 months. They take about 30 minutes.

The visit will involve:

• placing electrodes onto your wrists and ankles
• placing a telemetry header over where your implant was inserted.

The technologists will then run various tests and record the findings.

A letter will be sent to your healthcare provider to inform them of your visit and the results of the tests.

Cardiac inherited diseases

A small team based in Wellington focuses on investigating and treating inherited cardiac disease.

Part of a national service, the team is made up of:

• pathologists
• cardiologists
• GPs
• paediatricians
• patients.

The Wellington branch of the Cardiac Inherited Diseases Group works closely with Genetic Health Service New Zealand.

Genetic Health Service New Zealand (external link)

Cardiac Inherited Diseases Group (external link)

Cardiothoracic

The cardiothoracic service provides care for people with heart or lung problems who require surgery or other similar invasive tests and treatments.

We treat people from:

• Wellington, Porirua and Kapiti
• Hutt Valley
• Wairarapa
• Manawatū-Whanganui
• Hawke's Bay
• Nelson Marlborough.

Heart or lung transplants and most paediatric surgery cases are referred to Auckland.

Surgery

The cardiothoracic service provide emergency (acute) and planned (elective) surgeries such as:

• coronary artery bypass graft surgery (CABG)
• heart valve surgery
• aortic aneurysm repairs (an abnormal bulge in the wall of the major blood vessel carrying blood from your heart)
• removal of lung tissue for treatment or diagnosis of tumours
• management of problems with the space that surrounds the lung (pleural space)
• chest trauma —such as fractured ribs or sternum following a fall or accident (this may be managed with or without surgery).

Cardiology

Your healthcare provider (such as your GP) will refer you to one of our outpatient clinics if they are concerned about your heart and want a specialist opinion.

Each referral is prioritised depending on urgency, so those with more serious conditions will be seen first.

Cardiothoracic

A referral for this service must come from a healthcare provider, such as a GP or hospital specialist.

Your GP may refer you for emergency (acute) or planned (elective) surgery.

If you are having heart surgery, you may also be referred to a cardiologist for ongoing care after the operation.

The referral process

Heart surgery referrals

Your cardiologist will refer you for surgery. Cardiologists are specialists who treat heart diseases but don't perform operations. They refer patients from Wellington and the wider region for consideration of heart surgery.

The referring cardiologist is responsible for arranging for any tests required such as angiograms or ultrasound heart scans to be carried out..

Our team will then provide a recommendation to the referring cardiologist. This is usually further tests, a non-surgical plan or recommendation for surgery.

Further tests

These might be new tests, or repeating previous tests if they were too long ago. This is to ensure that our team have the necessary information to give advice on treatment options.

A non-surgical plan

Surgery is not always the best treatment option. There are procedures and medications that are sometimes the best treatment for coronary or heart valve disease. Cardiologists carry out these procedures. Patients from outside of Wellington may need to travel to Wellington Regional Hospital for these procedures.

Recommendation for surgery

Patients are then placed on the waiting list for surgery. We may still need to run more tests before having the surgery — for example all patients planning heart valve operations will need to have had a dental assessment and complete their dental treatments before having their heart operation

Lung surgery referrals

A variety of specialists may refer patients for consideration for lung surgery. They may need to arrange for scans or lung tests before making the referral.

Our team will then advise on whether surgery may be beneficial, and any other tests or treatments that may be required. Sometimes they recommend that patients see a surgeon in clinic to discuss surgery options.

If the referral is related to a possible cancer, a cancer nurse coordinator will help manage the various tests and treatments patients need.

Non-surgical lung procedures are dealt with according to clinical priority.

The wait list

Once surgery has been recommended and tests completed, patients are placed on a wait list for surgery. The cardiothoracic team send out a letter explaining this in a pack with other information, which may include:

• a health questionnaire for patients to complete and return
• an information leaflet about the proposed operation
• a leaflet about the Wellington regional heart and lung unit
• National Travel Assistance scheme information
• a dental checklist — for patients who need to complete a dental assessment prior to their operation
• information about blood thinners (anticoagulents) — for patients who are likely to need to take this type of medication after their operation e.g. certain types of heart valves.

The wait list is not a simple queue. Every person's need for surgery is prioritised according to:

• the severity of their condition
• the ability to benefit from surgery
• the risks of delaying surgery.

People are added or removed from the list every week and priorities may change. The most urgently needed operations happen within a few days of being put on the list. Less urgent heart operations are expected to happen within 90 days of being added to the list. Lung operations for cancer are subject to the “faster cancer treatment” target.

Health targets — Health New Zealand | Te Whatu Ora (external link)

A cardiothoracic liaison nurse manages the wait list.

They may call you to make sure that the information pack has been received, and discuss what happens next. They also contact you when there is a date for your operation.

If you are on the wait list you should be available and ready for your operation.

You should tell the liaison nurse if:

• any significant life events make you unavailable for specific time periods
• your symptoms progress
• other illnesses are diagnosed
• you chose to have your operation in the private healthcare system.

For people travelling to Wellington for surgery

Find out how the National Travel Assistance scheme supports eligible people who need to travel long distances or travel frequently for specialist treatment.

National Travel Assistance (internal link)

If you think you may be eligible for this, register with the scheme to check your entitlement as soon as you are on the wait list for surgery.

Your surgery and hospital stay

Your surgeon is usually allocated when the date of your operation is booked in.

Sometimes dates have to change due to urgent needs of other patients, or other factors. A different surgeon may then do the operation.

Elective patients are usually admitted to the ward the day before their operation, and meet their surgeon then.

Acute patients will already be in hospital, or transferred to Wellington Regional Hospital from their local hospital a few days before their operation.

Inpatient services are based in Ward 6 South, the heart and lung unit.

• Information about the heart and lung unitPDF1.3 MB
• Information about cardiac surgeryPDF655 KB
• Information about thoracic surgeryPDF1.8 MB

After your surgery

You are discharged from the ward when you have had your operations or treatments and are well enough to not need hospital care anymore. If you are from out of Wellington and have been transferred urgently by air ambulance for an operation you may still need to make arrangements to get home.

If you live alone, you may wish to arrange for whānau or friends to stay for a few days after you get home from the operation. This is especially important after heart operations (coronary artery bypass or heart valve surgery) when we recommend you have a support person available for a week.

Alternatively, you could arrange convalescent care, or access support — social workers can assess what support may be available, and whether these are funded or not.

You should not drive for at least 4 weeks after having heart surgery.

Follow up after discharge depends on what is required. Most people will be given a prescription for medications to get from a pharmacy. People are often asked to see a GP a few days after leaving hospital. Surgeons or other specialists sometimes want to see people in clinic a few weeks after their operation.

People who have had heart operations are usually referred to a cardiac rehabilitation or specialist cardiac nurse service. These support recovery and ongoing wellbeing, as well as reducing patients' risk of future heart events.

Recovering after cardiac surgery — patient informationPDF655 KB