Photography: Mark Humphries
Dr. John F. Seaworth was a busy cardiologist in 1993 when his office manager got him in touch with her brother, who was practicing cardiology in California, but wanted to come home to San Antonio.
At first, Seaworth and Dr. Juan L. Garza practiced separately, but shared calls with each other and four other physicians. Then, in January 1994, the six cardiologists formed a group practice, and the Heart and Vascular Institute of Texas (HAVIT) was born.
Their office in Northeast San Antonio was considered an outpost of the city at the time. But as San Antonio and HAVIT grew, the practice pushed existing boundaries of geography, innovation and service.
HAVIT was one of the first local cardiology practices to expand beyond San Antonio, and the first to position cardiologists in hospitals, as well as in office clinics to better serve patients.
From the start, HAVIT doctors focused heavily on reducing the risk of heart disease, aggressively treating and educating patients about diet, exercise and medications.
Today, HAVIT boasts 14 physicians; 117 employees; five fulltime offices in San Antonio, New Braunfels and Seguin; and satellites in Kenedy, Canyon Lake, Castroville, Hondo and Bandera.
Go to the HAVIT website (www.havit.com), and you’ll learn that the group was founded “to provide a comprehensive cardiac care program offering the latest in preventive, diagnostic, interventional and rehabilitative services designed to maximize cardiovascular health.”
Seaworth and Garza each chose to specialize in cardiology while thinking about or doing something else.
“I was a civil engineer,” Seaworth says. “I went to school by working in a hospital at night, and it was back before doctors were even in emergency rooms – it was just the nurses and me.
“I was the respiratory therapy technician, and the exciting things happening were related to cardiology. So even in college, I got interested in cardiology.”
Seaworth became an Air Force cardiologist, retiring from the military in 1991 to start a private practice. He was fellowship-trained in cardiovascular diseases at Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina.
As a child, Garza accompanied his father, a San Antonio internist, on hospital rounds. Originally, he planned to specialize in gastroenterology.
“As I was finishing my training in medical school, my dad had me go on rounds with a gastroenterologist one day and a cardiologist another day,” Garza says. “It was fascinating how many different ways patients could be evaluated in cardiology and the impact you can have on someone’s life.
“As I tell my patients, ‘your heart is your engine, and if your engine is in good shape, then the rest of you works pretty well. And if your engine is not, then all the other organ systems suffer.’”
Garza was fellowship-trained in invasive/noninvasive cardiology and pacemakers/electrophysiology at the University of California at Irvine, and he is a fellow of the American College of Cardiology.
HAVIT is an academically oriented group of board-certified physicians in various subspecialties. Top-notch credentials aside, they also know how to connect with people. That personal touch goes a long way toward helping patients because the thought of heart disease or a heart attack is scary.
Heart disease is the No. 1 killer of men and women in the United States, with cancer and stroke ranking second and third. Symptoms of heart disease differ in men and women.
Male patients often complain of pressure, heaviness, aching and discomfort during exertion; female patients seek help for sudden fatigue, lack of energy and night sweats. Women may also feel pain in their arm or jaw.
Visits by doctors to rural areas extend the reach of HAVIT’s expertise. Once or twice a week, Seaworth and Dr. Stephen Sokolyk travel 60 miles away to Kenedy.
“There are many people [who] won’t drive to San Antonio,” Seaworth says. “It’s nice for the patients – they are very appreciative. We see them in the hospital when we are there, so it allows the general surgeons to do procedures they don’t do otherwise.”
HAVIT physicians provide medical and surgical care for cardiovascular diseases and cardiac rehabilitation. Its physicians participate in clinical research studies, and they offer wellness services. Special clinics range from testing and adjusting dosage of the blood thinner Coumadin to tune-ups for and replacements of pacemakers.
Patient education videos featuring HAVIT physicians take the mystery out of medical jargon and procedures with clear explanations and illustrations. For instance, did you know that the main pumping chamber of the heart is shaped like the bottom half of a football? (See: www.havit.com/PatientVideos.html.)
HAVIT doctors get referrals from primary-care physicians, but also from their patients.
“As you take care of patients, they bring family members to you,” Garza says. “The families bring an aunt or a brother or a loved one, so you end up seeing them, as well.”
The physicians also get referrals from a sports medicine orthopedic group and see professional and student athletes to ensure their hearts are healthy enough for them to play sports.
Then there are those who need cardiac care, but don’t get it, despite telltale symptoms.
“People should never have that first heart attack or first stroke,” Seaworth says. “Diabetes, vascular disease and erectile dysfunction are signs of coronary disease. Eighty percent of those patients may die of coronary disease and should be considered as having coronary disease or coronary disease equivalence, and they should see a cardiologist to work on primary risk reduction. We are not seeing as many of that group of patients as we should.”
Since the practice was founded, HAVIT has focused heavily on reducing the risk of heart disease in patients.
Dr. Edwin “Eli” Whitney joined HAVIT in 1994 from Wilford Hall Medical Center at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio. There, Whitney started the first big trial study of people who didn’t have heart disease, but were at risk of developing it. Diet, exercise and medication helped reduce the risk.
A more recent trial study shows that treating people with symptoms of heart disease with medication, a heart-healthy diet and exercise can be as effective as surgery, stents and balloons, Seaworth says.
During HAVIT’s early years, most doctors split their time evenly between their offices and hospitals. That involved a lot of running back-and-forth.
To make the practice more efficient for doctors and patients, HAVIT began positioning cardiologists in hospitals in 1997. That way, the doctors are readily available to emergency room patients, to patients admitted to the hospital from HAVIT offices and to referring doctors seeking consultations.
This year brought a new chapter in HAVIT’s evolution: an alliance with Baptist Health System of San Antonio. In February, the practice was acquired by BHS Specialty Network, Inc.
HAVIT doctors see patients at Northeast Baptist, North Central Baptist and St. Luke’s Baptist hospitals and at other hospital systems in the San Antonio area.
That partnership benefits patients.
“Our alignment with HAVIT provides us with a premier group of cardiologists with both broad geographic distribution and subspecialty expertise,” says Michael Zucker, Baptist’s senior vice president and chief development officer. “[It] allows physicians to focus more of their time on the practice of medicine and treating patients.”
For more information, contact Lauraine Miller at misslauraine@yahoo.com, 512-722-3492 or 361-548-6301 (cell).
