A banner commemorating Parkersburg Cardiology Associates Inc.’s 50th anniversary outside its building across from the WVU Medicine Camden Clark Medical Center. (Photo Provided)

PARKERSBURG — For 50 years, Parkersburg Cardiology Associates Inc. has been at the heart of providing the Mid-Ohio Valley with heart care through changing times and new techniques.

Parkersburg Cardiology Associates Inc. (PCA) was started in 1972 by Dr. Michael A Santer Jr. and he was joined a year later by Dr. M. David Avington.

Both men were from Parkersburg and had gone into cardiology and had met again, by chance, at a medical conference. The two began talking about their plans with both wanting to return to the Mid-Ohio Valley, believing there was a need here.

“It is exciting for me to see what has developed in cardiac care in the last 50 years and what has been done in Parkersburg,” Santer said. “Now, experts across the country have developed treatment for what at one time was considered a fatal disease. Now if a patient with symptoms acts soon enough get to the hospital, the sooner they can be treated and helped.

“It is amazing,” Avington added. “When we started the practice, we had no idea this would go along and hit this milestone.

The building housing Parkersburg Cardiology Associates Inc. began construction in 2017 and opened in 2019. The practice is celebrating its 50th anniversary in the community. The practice spent many years at the medical office building at St. Joseph’s Hospital after being established in the early 1970s. (Photo Provided)

“I think it is really amazing because it is basically it has gotten better through the years. We have had some really talented and caring physicians as part of the group. They are continuing to do good things. It has got to be pretty exciting for everybody.”

Both doctors said when they first started if someone had a heart attack they were admitted to the hospital and monitored for a few weeks while the patient rested. It could be three months before the patient could return to any kind of activity, but usually they were not at the level they once were. Some did not survive to get out of the hospital. In many times they were left with a very weak heart and their life was never the same again.

Now, if someone comes soon enough, they can do an EKG test and they can go to the catheterization lab where tests are run, blockage is found in vessels in the heart and can be helped through an intervention. Angioplasty is where the blocked artery is opened and a stent is placed to keep the vessel to the heart open.

Santer said earlier interventions and actions that can be taken mean a better chance for the patient.

“Time is muscle,” he said.

Dr. M. David Avington (cardiologist) and Kathy Reeder (cardiology technician) perform an echocardiogram using one of the state-of-the-art diagnostic tools of The Heart Center of St. Joseph’s Hospital in 1995. Avington is one of the founders of Parkersburg Cardiology Associates Inc. which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. (Photo Provided)

Steve Altmiller, president and CEO of WVU Medicine Camden Clark, said PCA has offered the most advanced healthcare services in the community for cardiac care.

“What they have built over the past 50 years to continue improving and innovating treatment for cardiac patients is a testament to their commitment and dedication to this community,” he said. “I feel fortunate that their partnership with WVU Medicine Camden Clark allows us the capabilities to meet the healthcare needs of so many in the Mid-Ohio Valley.”

For a number of years PCA was located at the medical office building at the former St. Joseph’s Hospital. A new building was completed near the campus of WVU Medicine Camden Clark Medical Center in 2019

In 1976, PCA began offering echocardiography. The first catheterization lab was open in 1988 with the first diagnostic catheterization in St. Joseph’s Hospital’s new catheterization lab was performed. In 1989, Hemant C. Modi, M.D., joined PCA as its first invasive cardiologist and began performing diagnostic catheterizations. Also in 1989, PCA began performing nuclear stress tests. The first open heart surgery in the area was performed at St. Joseph’s Hospital in 2004.

Over the years, PCA has seen growth in the demand for its services, said John Vickers, CEO Parkersburg Cardiology Associates who has been with the group for 22 years.

Dr. M. David Avington, Dr. Michael Santer Jr. and Arthur A Maher officially open the Cardiac Catheterization Lab at St. Joseph Hospital in 1988. Parkersburg Cardiology Associates Inc. (PCA) was started in 1972 by Santer and he was joined a year later by Avington. (Photo Provided)

“Heart disease is very prevalent in this area,” he said.

Technology and new procedures have allowed the doctors at PCA to save and improve lives, Vickers said, adding procedures continue to become less invasive.

PCA has offices in Elizabeth and Ripley at Jackson General Hospital where physicians travel to see patients.

Many of the people working at PCA have integrated themselves into the community and made lives for themselves here, Vickers said.

Modi has been a part of PCA for 33 years helping to make the local catheterization lab more locally operated which opened the door to recruit more people.

In 1973, the physicians office building was built at St. Joseph’s Hospital. The location would be the home of Parkersburg Cardiology Associates until its new building on the campus of WVU Medicine Camden Clark Medical Center was completed in 2019. (Photo Provided)

“More associates joining brought additional skills,” he said. “The scope of services has substantially increased. Now we have a pretty broad range of cardiovascular services.”

Over the years they have been able to place stents locally where at one time they had to be sent away to places like Charleston, Columbus, Cleveland and elsewhere.

However, the basic concept has not changed in they are providing heart care to the local community.

“It is more refined and more things have been added to it,” Modi said.

The ways of identifying those at risk from heart disease and conditions have also improved with imaging and other tests. PCA is beginning to do Cardiac MRI and doing more advance Cardiac CT options.

Parkersburg Cardiology Associates Inc. is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. The practice has grown over that time bringing in new doctors with new specialties in treating heart disease and conditions in the Mid-Ohio Valley. (Photo Provided)

“The heart is constantly moving,” Modi said. “To get a clear picture of a high-speed moving target, you need a high-speed scanner which can grab a picture.”

Better heart care is leading to better lives for more people.

“The number of people having heart attacks in this country is decreasing,” Modi said. “The incidents of heart failure are increasing because people are living longer (and tend to die of natural causes).

“People are living longer and people who would have previously died from a heart attack now survive.”

David A. Gnegy, M.D., an invasive cardiologist, joined PCA in 1995. He has seen a lot of changes at the practice and is continuing to see changes.

Tasleem S. Katchi, M.D., an interventional cardiologist, will be joining PCA soon as PCA’s first female cardiologist.

Gnegy said more and more services are now available locally that people use to have to go out of town for, like angioplasty and putting in stents. Now being part of the WVU Medicine System they have that experience they can draw from and consult.

He said they are continually looking at bringing in new procedures to the area. One goal is to bring more structural heart disease treatments to the area. There are new procedures where doctors can replace an aortic valve much like having a heart catheterization performed.

“One goal is to offer more advance procedures here locally,” Gnegy said.

The practice has over 60 people employed there including physicians, nurse practitioners and others. Basically, they can do about any diagnostic testing, calcium scoring, pacemaker placement, catheterization, complex intervention and more.

“At this point, we serve the whole Mid-Ohio Valley,” Gnegy said. “Our practice has seen over 10,000 patients easily and there’s over tens of thousands easily whose lives we have touched.”

Brett Dunlap can be reached at bdunlap@newsandsentinel.com

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The Mission and Values of Parkersburg Cardiology Associates Inc. written by Dr. Michael A Santer Jr., one of the founders.

“Parkersburg Cardiology Associates strives to provide compassionate appropriate and comprehensive cardiac services to all people. We, as physicians, try to lead by example in medicine, as well as in our community. We acknowledge a spiritual dimension in our lives and assign a high priority to family relationships. We encourage patient participation in their health care decisions. We pledge to maintain our proficiency and quality through open discussion with our peers and through continuing education both as teachers and as students.”