Conditions & Treatments

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Overlake provides state-of-the-art diagnostic and therapeutic services and technologies within our specialty. Our physicians specialize in caring for both the common and complex pulmonary disorders that require the time and the expertise of a specialist in pulmonary diseases and critical care medicine. Patients will receive the highest level of care possible from highly trained technical and clinical staff who make your care their priority.
 

Procedures

  • Full cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET).
  • Complete pulmonary function testing (PFT).
  • Performance exercise testing (PXT).
  • Chest X-ray.
  • Fiberoptic bronchoscopy.
  • Endobronchial ultrasound.
  • Pleur-X catheter insertion.
     

Bronchial Thermoplasty

Bronchial Thermoplasty is a non-drug procedure that helps severe asthma patients achieve better control of their symptoms all year long. The procedure is being performed by pulmonologists skilled in bronchoscopy and specially trained to perform bronchial thermoplasty. Bronchial thermoplasty is an outpatient procedure that treats severe asthma by going directly to its source. The lungs consist of multiple airway passages surrounded by airway smooth muscle. For people with asthma, this airway smooth muscle is more susceptible to triggers and irritants causing it to constrict and reduce the amount of air flow through the lungs. Bronchial thermoplasty uses a small catheter to deliver controlled energy to the airways of the lung to reduce the amount of excessive airway smooth muscle. This reduction decreases the muscle’s ability to constrict the airways, resulting in a decreased frequency of asthma attacks.

Bronchial thermoplasty with the Alair® System is approved by the FDA for adults with severe asthma who are not well controlled on current medications, and is expected to complement asthma medications by providing long-lasting asthma control. The procedure is routinely performed under moderate sedation and the patient goes home the same day. To treat the entire lung, the complete bronchial thermoplasty procedure is performed in three separate outpatient treatment sessions, each treating a different area of the lung and scheduled approximately three weeks apart.

In clinical studies, the benefits of bronchial thermoplasty included reduced severe asthma attacks, decreased visits to the emergency room and hospital for respiratory symptoms, and less time lost from work or school due to asthma.

  • 44% average decrease in percent of patients having severe exacerbations compared to the year prior to bronchial thermoplasty.
  • 48% average decrease in severe exacerbation event rates compared to the year prior to bronchial thermoplasty.
  • 88% percent average decrease in ER visit event rates compared to the year prior to bronchial thermoplasty.