Innovative procedure saves Chicago man's foot from amputation due to peripheral artery disease

CHICAGO - It's not uncommon for patients with diabetes, or people who smoke, to have a foot or part of their leg amputated while battling this disease.

The culprit: peripheral artery disease.

In tonight's special report, Natalie Bomke has the story of how one Chicago doctor was able to save a patient's foot using a rarely performed procedure.

Cooking is one of the many things 39-year-old Antoine Lee likes to do in his spare time. However, it wasn't so enjoyable about a year ago.

"I wasn’t really able to really walk because it was just that painful," said Lee.

Lee had pain in his left foot, and he wasn't really sure where it was coming from.

"My wife just pushed me to go to a hospital and see what's going on," said Lee. "And that’s when we found out there was some blockages there."

That was when Lee found out he had Peripheral Artery Disease, or PAD.

He was immediately admitted and had an angioplasty done on his foot to restore blood flow.

"When the surgery was performed, there was only so many arteries he could angioplasty, which did get blood flow to the foot," said Lee.

There was one artery that was so constricted the doctor couldn't use angioplasty to open it up. If blood flow couldn't be restored to that artery, Lee could lose his foot. 

"You are very concerned because it's like, wow, how did my foot get to this point?" said Lee. "I recently had a kidney transplant and everything was going well and this happens."

That's when his doctor referred him to Dr. Kumar Madassery, a vascular interventional radiologist at Rush University Medical Center.  

He is one of only a handful of doctors in the world who can perform a procedure that could keep Lee's foot and lower leg from being amputated.

"Whether PAD is caused by smoking, diabetes, high blood pressure, genetics, or a few other conditions like kidney failure, what happens is you get plaque buildup in your arteries, similar to the heart," said Dr. Madassery. "Over the years now, several of us have taken on the procedure where we connect an artery to a vein, try to get the vein to start acting like an artery."

It is called deep vein arterialization, or DVA for short.

It's a non-invasive procedure that lasts about 90 minutes. 

Dr. Madassery has performed only 30 of them in the last two years. While this procedure can’t save every limb, he believes it can save more of them.

"In those patients who are facing 100 percent amputation, we are now able to have about a 60-70 percent limb salvage, meaning they can walk on their own," said Dr. Madassery.

After undergoing a DVA last fall, Lee is well on his way to walking on his own. He no longer needs a walker or a wheelchair. He now uses only a cane and is still making progress.

"It was a high risk that came with a high reward," said Lee.

A reward that Dr. Madassery says many patients miss out on. 

"Majority of other patients are told there are no other options because some don’t know. Some don’t know to ask, but similar to cancer treatments, patients and physicians should be aware to say it's okay to get another opinion from a dedicated specialist who deals with PAD and limb preservation," said Dr. Madassery. "There are several around the country and there’s more training."

That's why Lee urges other patients with peripheral artery disease not to give up.

"With all the pain that I went through, you got to let your pain be a promise that things are going to get better if you don’t give up, if you are willing to do the work," said Lee.

Dr. Madassery says there are 10 million people in the U.S. who have PAD.

It costs our healthcare system about $4 billion a year.

For patients who have an amputation, 60 percent of them die within the following five years, so it is imperative that it is prevented.