Patients at Rockford Memorial are being offered a different way to detect heart disease.

Physicians at the Heart and Vascular Center are now performing trans-radial cardiac catheterizations. This new transradial method inserts the catheter into the wrists instead of the groin. The purpose of the procedure is to check the heart and coronary arteries for disease. currently only three percent of these catheterizations are done through the wrists, but doctors at Rockford Memorial see many benefits from this method.

"Because it improves patients comfort and satisfaction. There's no bed rest involved after the procedure's done. And most importantly there is enough data out there that using a wrist as an access decreases the rate of bleeding complications which is one of the major issues in the intervention cardiological world." said Cardiologist Dr. Erbert Caceres.

Swedish Americn Hospital also uses transradial catheterization.