For patients waiting months for heart rhythm treatment, shaving hours off a procedure could be the difference between life and death.

Clinical studies are now testing a new catheter designed to heal unhealthy heart tissue with single, shorter energy pulses. The technology was designed, manufactured and tested in the European Union.

Around 10 percent of Europeans aged 60 and above are reported to suffer from heart arrhythmia. At Na Homolce Hospital in Czechia, doctors say the condition can look very different from one patient to the next.

“Clinical perception of the condition is highly variable,” explained Petr Neužil, Head of the Cardiology Clinic at Na Homolce Hospital, one of Czechia’s main hospitals, to Euronews.

“The patient may perceive nothing; they may be completely asymptomatic. Then, they can feel palpitations. They can feel breathless. They cannot breathe. And very often they feel weakness.”

Doctors at the hospital treat the condition with ablations using flexible tubes called catheters. The catheters are placed into blood vessels and guided to the heart. They then use heat or cold energy to create tiny scars on the surface of the heart. These scars help break up or insulate the electrical signals that cause irregular heartbeats.

In Czechia, hospitals can treat 10,000 patients each year, about one quarter of those who need care. Waiting lists can stretch for up to 10 months.

That shortage is one reason Na Homolce Hospital is taking part in the clinical study of the new catheter. The device is designed to cover more unhealthy tissue accurately with single, shorter energy pulses. Doctors involved in the study say the approach would safely speed up the process, improve patient recovery time, decrease waiting lists and cut operational costs.

“You spend less time with the catheter. You have a single shot. You lessen the applications, you lessen the manipulations and you lessen the tools you need to get inside,” explains Neužil.

The catheter was developed by BTL Industries, a family company that exports its medical products to 80 countries. The company says its new catheter and control unit were designed to make ablation faster and more accurate.

“The doctor places the catheter in the vein and ablates, with a single shot for the whole area all at once, as he needs it. So the time saved ranges from three hours to 15 minutes for ablation,” claims Martin Hanuliak, the company’s Head of Product Management.

“The procedure is safer because we apply microsecond, that is 1 millionth-of-a-second, pulses, which ideally destroy the myocardium and spare the other tissue, so the heart heals faster and better.”

BTL Industries employs 4,500 people worldwide, including 650 engineers. The company says the new catheter is more complex than standard devices now in use.

“The main difference between the catheter that we are developing here and the standard catheters is that ours is much more complex,” explains Jiří Dašek, product manager at the company.

“It contains very small parts that are less than one millimetre in size. The second difference is that our catheter moves, because in the past, the only catheters in use were straight and fixed, without any moving parts.”

If health authorities approve the device, the plan is for both the catheter and its control unit to be made entirely in the European Union.

The company already produces one million electronic boards every year at its manufacturing facilities. Those parts are then assembled in around 40,000 different medical devices.

“Our turnover usually grows by 10% or 15% on average, depending on the year. But it’s difficult to say which areas are growing. Sometimes cardiology expands faster, sometimes it’s physiotherapy. It depends on the products. If the company would like to keep growing, it needs to innovate,” explains Tomas Drbal, Chief Technology Officer.

The company says the new catheter is leading that push for innovation. The device is now being used in clinical studies, and doctors and developers hope it will be available on EU markets from the beginning of 2028.

You can see the full video at Euronews.