Our team of leading cardiac specialists offer comprehensive services and exceptional care.
Place your cardiac care in the safest of hands
Affiliated Provider
• Structural heart disease:
- Lung cancer
- Trauma
- Chest wall deformity
TAVI - inserting a new aortic valve via a tube from your leg.
PFO/ASD closure - closing holes in the heart via a tube from your leg.
Cardiology
• Angiography - direct injection of the heart arteries.
Diagnostic services
The Heart Centre team provides a broad range of services that enable us to diagnose and treat conditions related to the heart and blood vessels.
Treatment
Once the cardiologists have the data about the extent and severity of your heart disease they can identify the most appropriate treatment options and discuss these with you.
Recovery and rehabilitation
Our team of cardiologists and cardiac surgeons provide advice on the best way patients can recover from a cardiac event and reduce the risk of any others.
• PCI: Angioplasty and stents -
to open narrowed coronary arteries.
• Cardiac surgery
Surgery
- Coronary artery
bypass grafting
- Heart valve surgery
• Thoracic surgery
• EP: Electrophysiology & ablation - using catheters to diagnose and treat abnormal heart rhythms.
About us
Heart Centre was started in 2003 to facilitate excellence in the diagnosis and management of heart conditions in Christchurch.
Founding Directors included Dr Clive Low (Chair), Mr Jock Muir, Assoc Prof John Elliott, Prof Michael Williams, Mr Harsh Singh, and Dr David Bowie.
Our Clinicians
Our specialist team consists of cardiologists, cardiac surgeons, and an intensive care specialist who work with staff such as nurses and cardiac perfusionists, to make sure that people who need invasive surgical procedures such as cardiac catheterisation and open heart surgery receive the best care possible.
All our clinicians provide consultations at their own clinics and interventional treatment as at St George’s Hospital (Heart centre @ St George’s). They also support the District Health Boards in meeting their annual targets by providing treatment services for them at St George’s Hospital.
If you have concerns about your heart please discuss these with your doctor and/or contact the Heart Centre team.
Their contact details are:
Cardiologists
Christchurch
Dr Clive JS Low (Chair)
MB ChB FRACP FCSANZ
Clive is an experienced general and interventional cardiologist who is experienced in all forms of angioplasty and he works fulltime in private cardiology practice. In addition to his interventional work he has special expertise in heart rhythm disturbances, hypertension, heart failure and preventative cardiology.
Clive trained in Christchurch, Dunedin, St Mary's and Hammersmith Hospitals in London and the Mid America Heart Institute in Kansas City and worked as a consultant interventional cardiologist at Dunedin Hospital from 1993 to 2000, when he returned to Christchurch where he and his colleagues set up Heart Specialists, Heart Centre (2003) Ltd., and Heart Centre @ St George’s.
Heart Specialists
St Georges Hospital,
249 Papanui Road, Christchurch
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 351 9503
Fax: (03) 351 9578
Email: info@heartbeat.co.nz
Web: www.heartbeat.co.nz
Assoc Prof John M Elliott
BMedSc MB ChB PhD FRACP FCSANZ FACC
John is a General and Interventional cardiologist with expertise in the investigation and treatment of angina, myocardial infarction, high blood pressure, and abnormal lipids. He holds joint appointments as an interventional cardiologist at Christchurch Hospital, Associate Professor of Medicine in the University of Otago Christchurch School of Medicine and has been in part-time private practice since 1996.
John trained in Dunedin, Flinders Medical Centre, Adelaide, Green Lane Hospital, Auckland, and the Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio. He helped establish the angioplasty program at Christchurch Hospital, undertakes clinical audits, and research into novel cardiovascular medications and coronary stents. He has been the Chairman of the New Zealand Committee of the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand.
Christchurch Heart Group Ltd
Level 1, Milford Chambers
St Georges Hospital
249 Papanui Rd, Christchurch 8014
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 355 3750
Fax: (03) 355 3751
Email: john.elliott@otago.ac.nz
Dr David Smyth
MB BS MD FRACP FRCP (London) FCSANZ
David Smyth has experience in all forms of heart conditions and expertise in Interventional Cardiologist (stents) and Structural Heart Disease (Transcatheter Valves – TAVI). He trained at St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical College and Kings College Hospital, London, before coming to New Zealand.
David works at Christchurch Hospital where he is also the Chief of Medicine and works part time in private practice.
Christchurch Heart Group Ltd
Level 1, Milford Chambers
St Georges Hospital
249 Papanui Rd, Christchurch 8014
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 355 3750
Fax: (03) 355 3751
Email:
Dr Sue O'Malley
MB ChB (Otago) FRACP FRCP (London) FCSANZ
Sue is a cardiologist with expertise in adult cardiology, echocardiography, CT coronary angiography, selective coronary angiography, and nuclear cardiology. Sue manages the care of patients with hypertension, heart failure, valvular heart disease and ischaemic heart disease. She trained in Dunedin, London and Melbourne and returned to Christchurch in 2003.
Sue was appointed Clinical Leader in Nuclear Medicine at Christchurch Public hospital at the end of 2011 and developed the nuclear cardiology and nuclear medicine services.
Sue continues to work at Christchurch Hospital and in part-time private practice. She also holds weekly cardiology clinics in Wellington.
Christchurch Heart Group Ltd
Level 1, Milford Chambers
St Georges Hospital
249 Papanui Rd, Christchurch 8014
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 355 3750
Fax: (03) 355 3751
Email:
Dr James Blake
MB ChB FRACP FCSANZ
James is a General and Interventional Cardiologist who trained at the University of Otago, Green Lane Hospital in Auckland, Christchurch Hospital, and William Beaumont Hospital in Michigan, USA. In addition to part-time private practice, James is a Consultant Cardiologist at Christchurch Hospital.
James has expertise in the diagnosis and management of angina/coronary artery disease and aortic stenosis/valvular heart disease. He has sub-specialty training in coronary angioplasty/stenting and structural heart interventions including TAVI (trans-catheter aortic valve implantation), PFO (Patent Foramen Ovale) Closure, and ASD (Atrial Septal Defect) Closure. He also has additional training in the diagnosis and interventional management of peripheral arterial disease.
Christchurch Heart Group Ltd
Level 1, Milford Chambers
St Georges Hospital
249 Papanui Rd, Christchurch 8014
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 355 3750
Fax: (03) 355 3751
Email:
Dr Iain Melton
MBChB FRACP FCSANZ
Iain is a consultant cardiologist and cardiac electrophysiologist with expertise in general cardiology, medical and interventional management of heart rhythm disorders including atrial fibrillation, investigation of palpitations, ablation of abnormal heart rhythms, cardiac pacing/device therapy, and the management of syncope. He trained in Dunedin, Christchurch Hospital, and MCV Hospitals in the United States. He is a specialist consultant at Christchurch Hospital and works part-time in private practice.
Christchurch Heart Group Ltd
Level 1, Milford Chambers
St Georges Hospital
249 Papanui Rd, Christchurch 8014
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 355 3750
Fax: (03) 355 3751
Email:
Dr Matt Daly
MB CHB 2002 (OTAGO) FRACP 2010
Matt is a consultant cardiologist and cardiac electrophysiologist at Christchurch Hospital and in part-time private practice.
He completed general cardiology training in Christchurch and Ll'hôpital cardiologique du Haut-Lévêque de Bordeaux-Pessac in France. In addition to general cardiology, Matt is a heart rhythm specialist whose interests include the investigation and treatment of abnormal heart rhythms, unexplained syncope, palpitations, cardiac pacing and cardiac devices. He has a particular interest in catheter ablation of abnormal heart rhythms.
Christchurch Heart Group Ltd
Level 1, Milford Chambers
St Georges Hospital
249 Papanui Rd, Christchurch 8014
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 355 3750
Fax: (03) 355 3751
Email:
Dr Aniket Puri
MD, DM, FACC, FSCAI, FRACP
Aniket Puri is a Consultant General and Interventional Cardiologist at Christchurch Hospital. He has been in this role since 2012.
Aniket has been in Cardiology teaching and practice since 2003. He was an Associate Professor of Cardiology at King George’s Medical University, India before relocating to New Zealand. He trained in India in a high volume and highly competitive academic environment. He did Advance Coronary Intervention fellowships in at Asan Medical Centre, Korea and Waikato Hospital, New Zealand.
He was awarded the Australia New Zealand Endovascular Therapies (ANZET) Best Fellow Prize in 2008. He continues to be involved with Research, Publications and Presentations with his main area of interest being Coronary Imaging and Physiology. Most recently he was awarded at Kobe, Japan in 2017, for his work on Spontaneous Coronary Artery Dissections. He also holds Fellowships of American College of Cardiology (FACC) and Society of Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (FSCAI).
Christchurch Heart Group Ltd
Level 1, Milford Chambers
St Georges Hospital
249 Papanui Rd, Christchurch 8014
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 355 3750
Fax: (03) 355 3751
Email:
Dr Dougal McClean
MB ChB FRACP MD FCSANZ
Dougal McClean is an interventional and general cardiologist working at Christchurch Hospital and in private practice.
He trained at Christchurch Hospital, King’s College Hospital, London, and Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre, Los Angeles, USA.
Dougal specialises in investigation of chest pain and angina with coronary angiography proceeding to stent(s), and new interventional devices and techniques to treat calcium or branch (bifurcation) lesions, and chronic total occlusions (CTO), as an alternative to Bypass Surgery. Dougal is involved in multi-centre interventional trials of next generation drug eluting stent designs, fully dissolving stents, dedicated branching stents, and intra-coronary imaging to guide stents.
Cardiology Specialists
Ground Floor
Hiatt Chambers (Cnr Leinster and Papanui Roads)
St Georges Medical Centre
249 Papanui Road, Christchurch
New Zealand
Phone: 03 355 6056
Email:
Dunedin
Professor Michael Williams
MD FRACP FACC FCSANZ
Michael trained in Dunedin and Massachusetts General Hospital – Boston, USA. He specialises in diagnosing and treating chest pain and provides cardiovascular risk assessments including exercise ECG and echocardiography stress testing, Holder monitoring, event monitoring, 24 hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring and echocardiography. Michael specialises in performing angioplasty and stent implants at the Mercy Heart Centre and is an affiliated provider to Southern Cross. He also holds clinics in Invercargill, Gore and Central Otago one day a month.
Southern Heart
Suite 15, Marinoto Clinic
72 Newington Ave, Dunedin
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 467 6174
Email: mail@southernheart.co.nz
Auckland
Assoc Prof Patrick Kay
PhD FRACP FCANZ FSCAI FESC
Dr Patrick Kay trained in medicine and cardiology in New Zealand and the Netherlands. He has expertise in angioplasty, stenting and all major investigations and consults broadly on all areas of adult cardiology.
Middlemore and Auckland Hospitals
Phone: (09) 276 0000
Fax: (09) 276 0282
Email: patrick.kay@middlemore.co.nz
Cardiac Surgeons
Christchurch
Mr Harsh Singh
MBBS MS FRCS(UK) CTS FRACS
Harsh trained in India, the UK and Ireland, gaining extensive experience and training at the Mater Misericordiae Hospital, Dublin and Cork University Hospital, Cork. He presently works as a Consultant Cardiac and Thoracic Surgeon at Christchurch Hospital. He helped establish the Cardiothoracic Unit at Christchurch Hospital and at the St George’s Hospital. Harsh holds a number of executive positions in Clinical Governance Organisations at a National level and has been the Chair of the National Cardiac Surgical Network. He is the Clinical Supervisor for Cardio Thoracic Surgical Training at the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and is also involved in medical staff training through the University of Otago. Harsh specialises in adult cardiac and thoracic surgery, cardiac tumours, video assisted thoracic surgery, chest trauma and chest wall reconstruction surgery.
Cardiac and Thoracic Surgical Practice (CTSP)
Specialists@256,
256 Papanui Road, Christchurch 8041
New Zealand
Phone: 027 9002877
Email: surgeons@ctsurgeons.co.nz
Mr David Shaw
MB ChB BMedSc FRACS
David is a consultant surgeon. He trained in Dunedin, Auckland and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston and has practiced in Australia and Dunedin before coming to Christchurch. David specialises in Cardiac surgery with a special interest in Off pump Coronary surgery. Heart Valve surgery and Aortic Root surgery. He is also a general thoracic surgeon. David works at Christchurch Hospital and privately at St George’s Hospital.
Christchurch Heart and Lung Surgeons
Specialists @ 256
256 Papanui Road, Strowan
Christchurch 8014
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 356 0999
Fax: (03) 03 356 0996
Email: heartsurgeons@xtra.co.nz
Intensive Care
Christchurch
Dr David Bowie
Intensive Care Specialist
MBChB FANZCA FCICM
David is a specialist in Intensive Care Medicine and Anaesthesia. He graduated from Otago Medical School in 1978 and obtained specialist qualifications in Anaesthesia and Intensive Care. He has practiced in Dunedin and Christchurch where he established the Christchurch Cardiac Unit. He has a special interest in the intensive care management of patients who have had cardiac surgery and anaesthetics. He Chairs the New Zealand Flying Doctor trust.
St George's Hospital
249 Papanui Road, Christchurch
New Zealand
Phone: (03) 355 9179
Fax: (03) 355 2057
Email: davidbowie@paradise.net.nz
Diagnostic services
The Heart Centre team provides a broad range of services that enable us to diagnose and treat conditions related to the heart and blood vessels.
Echocardiogram
Cardiac catheterisation
Cardiac assessments
All our cardiologists have the expertise to undertake treadmill exercise tests, heart ultrasound or echocardiography, holter monitoring and blood pressure monitoring. These tests enable us to see what kind of physical stress your heart can cope with, whether the electrical and nervous impulses that make your heart work are firing properly, how well the heart muscle and valves are working, and identify the effect of blood pressure on your heart and your overall health.
To gain a complete picture of your heart, cardiologists can take pictures of it using a procedure called a coronary angiography, nuclear medicine techniques, or with a CT scanner. All these tests require highly specialised equipment and some require the joint skills of cardiologists and radiologists so they are not performed in the cardiologists rooms.
Once the data from all these tests is collected and collated, our cardiologists are able to precisely identify and understand any problems you may be having. This means, they can, for example, identify if the cause of the problem relates to your heart muscle, its nerves, its valves, or the blood vessels supplying the heart with oxygen (the coronary arteries). They can also identify if the problem lies with the blood vessels in the rest of the body. They then go on to examine any problems in detail. For example, in the case of coronary arteries they go on to identify exactly which specific part of the coronary arteries are damaged.
CTCA
Angiography: Taking pictures of the heart and blood vessels
Taking pictures of the heart requires sophisticated technology so Heart Centre has made a commitment to making sure our clinicians have access to the best equipment available. Heart Centre has invested in an advanced Cardiac Catheterisation Laboratory (Cath Lab), which is located at St George's Hospital. This machine enables our cardiologists to obtain high-resolution images of the heart and its coronary arteries and other blood vessels around the body including those in the brain. This also enables us to perform angioplasty procedures to fix any problems that they find.
We have entered into a relationship with the Christchurch Radiology Group (CRG), now Pacific Radiology Group (PRG), so that our cardiologists can use their staff and CT scanner, a $2.2m Siemens Somatom definition, to get highly detailed three-dimensional pictures of the heart (CTCA). This is similar to having an x-ray. You simply lie on a table and the scanner takes pictures of your heart. The PRG radiologists make sure the pictures are of the highest quality. Heart Vision now also provides cardiac magnetic resonance imaging of the heart. (Visit Heart Vision site).
Treatment
Once the cardiologists have the data about the extent and severity of your heart disease they can identify the most appropriate treatment options and discuss these with you.
Cardiac Catheterisation procedure
Medical treatment
We will present the treatment options available so you can make informed decisions.
Nutrition and exercise
Our clinicians offer a wide variety of treatment options to patients. In the first instance, they provide advice about your diet and the amount and type of exercise you need to improve the health of your heart.
Drug treatment
Reviewing the results of cardiac catheterisation
Cardiac Surgery
As well as using a range of drugs to help your heart beat more effectively, they can also use them to control blood pressure.
PCI: Angioplasty and stents
When this is appropriate, our interventional cardiologists, Dr Clive Low, Assoc Prof John Elliott, Dr Dougal McClean, Dr David Smyth, Dr James Blake, Dr Anekti Puri and Professor Michael Williams, are able to repair the blood vessels of the heart. They have special expertise in widening the coronary arteries and inserting stents (tiny wire tubes) into them.
TAVI: Transcatheter aortic valve implantation
This minimally invasive surgical procedure repairs the valve without removing the old, damaged valve. The new valve is inserted via a tube passing from your leg artery up into your chest and expanded inside your old valve. This avoids the need for open heart surgery for treatment of aortic stenosis.. Dr James Blake and Dr David Smyth are specialists in this procedure.
EP: Electrophysiology
An electrophysiology (EP) study is a test performed to assess your heart's electrical system or activity and is used to diagnose abnormal heartbeats or arrhythmia. These procedures allow cardiac electrophysiologists to treat heart rhythm disorders such as supraventricular tachycardia and atrial fibrillation. The test is performed by inserting catheters and then wire electrodes, which measure electrical activity, through blood vessels that enter the heart.
Dr Iain Melton and Dr Matt Daly are specialists in this procedure.
Heart Surgery
Not all heart problems can be treated with even the best advice, medication or stents. Some people need open-heart surgery. Heart Centre's cardiac surgeons', Mr Harsh Singh and Mr David Shaw have trained extensively both in New Zealand and overseas and provide care that is the best available internationally.
They have perfected the skills that enable them to repair the heart without stopping it beating. This means less trauma and complications for patients than is the case when the heart is stopped during surgery, and their success rate is amongst the best in Australasia.
They operate in the theatres at St George's Hospital. Patients recover from this surgery in the Heart Centre intensive care unit located there. Dr David Bowie is our intensive care physician.
Thoracic Surgery
Thoracic surgery refers to operations performed on the lungs and chest wall. The most common operation in the chest is for removal of whole or part of the lung for treating Lung Cancer. Our surgeons undertake this with a minimally invasive approach, allowing for early recovery with minimal pain. Other thoracic procedures performed include repair of pectus deformity, tumors of the chest wall, thoracic trauma, pleural disease and removal of thymic lesions.
Recovery and rehabilitation
Our team of cardiologists and cardiac surgeons provide advice on the best way patients can recover from a cardiac event and reduce the risk of any others.
Care and prevention
As well as providing intensive care and in-patient post-operative recovery care our cardiologists advise on what is known as cardiac rehabilitation - how to resume a normal life after a cardiac event and minimise the chances of this happening again. Our clinicians have also developed an exercise programme called bounceBack that is especially tailored to people with cardiac conditions. Exercise as Medicine works with us to provide the BounceBack programme.
BounceBACK is a professional cardiac exercise programme that will teach you how to exercise effectively and safely following cardiac treatment or diagnosis.
Who is eligible?
Anyone with a cardiac condition who has been cleared to exercise by their surgeon, cardiologist, GP or cardiac nurse.
Times
Tuesdays and Fridays
2.15pm - 3.30pm for 6 weeks (12 sessions)
There are also two one-on-one one hour appointments (prior to and following the course) to be arranged at your convenience.
Venue
Bodyfix Gym, 29 Leeds St, Phillipstown (Off Fitzgerald Ave)
Contact
Kris Tynan (Programme Director) Exercise as Medicine NZ
kris@eamnz.com or 021 2628886