San Angelo's First Outpatient Cath Lab to Open

SAN ANGELO, TX — San Angelo is getting its first outpatient catheterization lab, bringing a new level of convenience, cost savings and state-of-the art care to the area.

Dr. Milton Leon, a local Interventional cardiologist, will open the San Angelo Cardiovascular Center of Excellence in mid-January of 2020. Dr. Leon’s facility will be located adjacent to his recently renovated existing medical office at 3180 Executive Drive, Suite #102, San Angelo, and will focus on the treatment of Peripheral Artery Disease, also known as P.A.D.

P.A.D. is a condition whereby the arteries in the legs become blocked and blood cannot flow properly into the legs and feet. One in 20 Americans over the age of 50 have P.A.D. People who smoke, who have smoked in the past, who have diabetes, high cholesterol, family history of P.A.D. or aneurysm of the aorta, kidney disease or high blood pressure are all at increased risk of developing P.A.D. People oftentimes have no symptoms, but most people with PAD will complain of weak, heavy or painful legs or have wounds at their legs which have not healed despite appropriate local wound care treatments. Left untreated, P.A.D. can lead to amputation.

Dr. Leon offers a simple, in-office, blood pressure-like test of the legs to test for P.A.D. that can be performed in less than 15 minutes. The San Angelo Cardiovascular Center of Excellence specializes in treatments and interventions to restore the blood flow to legs and feet. The center provides these treatments in an outpatient environment, meaning most patients go home in just a few hours.

The Center is an office-based catheterization lab, or O.B.L. It will be San Angelo’s first and only O.B.L. Patients treated at Dr. Leon’s facility will receive one-on-one nursing care and will not be exposed to sick patients while in the facility. It is well known that patients who receive medical care in a hospital are at greater risk of acquiring an infection during their hospital stay as compared to patients who are treated in an outpatient facility. An additional benefit: when compared to a hospital, patients often pay significantly less money to have their procedure performed at an O.B.L.

“By specializing exclusively in cardiovascular care, we are able to deliver high-quality, minimally invasive treatments for patients with P.A.D. and get patients home the same day.”, said Dr. Leon.

Dr. Leon teamed up with Austin-based Arise Vascular to develop and manage his facility.

“Arise Vascular believes that being physician-led means greater success for physicians and patients. We are experts in the outpatient cardiovascular industry with a purposefully designed organization dedicated to control quality at every step,” said Jared Leger, CEO of Arise Vascular. “We pride ourselves on extremely high patient satisfaction scores that can be attributed to our careful selection of clinical support staff. In San Angelo we had lots of interested clinical staff applicants, and after rigorous review, selected the highest-quality staff members.”

Arise Vascular currently owns and operates outpatient cardiovascular facilities in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma, with plans to expand into other states.