Although Jack Leber felt well, his doctors recommended imaging. “The results of that were saying that one of the valves was getting smaller over time.”

That narrowing is called aortic stenosis. It reduces blood flow from the heart to the rest of the body. “Activities they used to tolerate now becoming more difficult for them to do, and they're feeling short of breath and lack the energy to do that,” said Cardiothoracic Surgeon Dr. Michael DeFrain.

Dr. DeFrain preformed a minimally invasive TAVR procedure to combat the narrowing. The Shipley Center was the first program in Florida to implement TAVR after FDA approval in 2011. Since then, the team has preformed more than 2,000. “The catheter, typically from the groin, allows us to reach that area of the body. And then the TAVR valve itself is constrained onto the catheter. It's crimped onto the catheter. And then when we place it in the proper position, we expand it either using a balloon or by unsheathing it, and it wants to expand, pushing the leaflet tissue out of the way that's causing the problem. And then the functioning new valve resides within that expanded metal cage.”

Leber spent one night in the hospital but said he didn’t deal with any pain. “It wasn't open heart surgery,” said Leber. “It was through the leg up to the artery and so I didn't really feel anything other than getting ready to go play golf again.”

Cardiac rehab helped him regain his strength, and he was able to golf the week following the procedure. You can learn more by searching for TAVR on leehealth.org.


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Lee Health in Fort Myers, FL is the largest network of health care facilities in Southwest Florida and is highly respected for its expertise, innovation and quality of care. For more than 100 years, we’ve been providing our community with personalized preventative health services and primary care to highly specialized care services and robotic assisted surgeries.

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