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In 2008 Cedars-Sinai once again ranked as one of the country's top hospitals in Heart and Heart Surgery in the annual guide to the "America's Best Hospitals" edition of U.S. News & World Report.

Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute

Cedars-Sinai's international reputation for outstanding heart care is built on decades of innovation and leading-edge research, including:

• Introducing the first electrocardiogram machine used in Los Angeles
• Initiating the concept of a Cardiac Care Unit
• Discovering a technique in 1953 for using an enzyme to dissolve blood clots in the heart (By 1982, Cedars-Sinai had become one of the first medical centers in the United States to test this therapy in human beings. Today, this treatment has become the worldwide standard for treating heart attacks.)
• Inventing the Swan-Ganz catheter, which measures how well the heart is working in critically ill patients, triggering a revolution in critical care, management of burns, heart attacks, adult respiratory distress syndrome and all forms of circulatory shock
• Introducing the use of drugs to dilate blood vessels, revolutionizing the way that heart failure and severe heart disorders are treated
• Pioneering what is today one of the most widely used methods of analyzing blood flow, measured by the appearance and disappearance of radioisotopes in the heart muscle of patients, becoming a leader in nuclear cardiology
• Developing a laser system to vaporize blockages in the blood vessels of patients with coronary artery disease and becoming a world leader in excimer laser angioplasty
• Creating techniques that use fiber optics to diagnose vascular disease, providing fresh insights into the factors that contribute to heart attacks

From cardiac rehabilitative and preventive care and heart transplantation to the training of the heart specialists of tomorrow and leading-edge research that is deepening medical knowledge and practice, Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute is known around the world for excellence.

Cedars-Sinai Women's Heart Center provides risk assessment, diagnosis and heart disease care that is specifically tailored to women.