This device saved a former Mid-South minister from heart failure

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (WMC) - A former Mid-South minister is praising the heart procedure he calls a medical miracle.

Richard Corum loves golf. So much so, the retired hospice chaplain works part-time at a golf course.

“I can play out here for free,” he chuckled, while also talking about how his job has him walking about 7 miles a day.

But last year, Richard was barely able to walk, let alone play golf.

”I couldn’t do anything. I could not walk up a flight of stairs without being out of breath," he explained.

It was heart failure and Corum was convinced he wouldn’t survive.

“It got to the point where I was literally--I was planning my funeral. I had my headstone not only purchased, you can go to McNairy County to a little place called Milledgeville and there sets my tombstone. It’s there,” he declared.

But, while searching the internet one day, Corum read about a company called CVRx and its Barostim device.

Dr. Dmitry Yaranov, the Program Director for Advanced Failure/Heart Transplant and Mechanical Circuitry Support for Baptist Hospital and Stern Cardiovascular, implanted the Barostim in Corum’s chest.

“We here at Baptist have been using Barostim for the last almost four years. We started our program back in 2021, right at the time the pandemic hit,” Dr. Yaranov said.

And although the Barostim looks like a pacemaker, it works much differently.

“Where it goes it goes to the right side of your neck, where nerve bundles are controlling the blood flow to our brain. By stimulating those nerve bundles, what I can do is I can trick your brain into thinking you don’t have heart failure,” he described.

When taken with prescribed heart medications, CVRx says Barostim has a 94 percent success rate with heart failure patients -- a prevalent condition throughout the Mid-South where the leading cause of death is heart disease.

“Unfortunately our tri-state area, it is the reddest of the red where in terms of heart failure mortality and prevalence of heart failure,” Dr. Yaranov explained, adding, “So we are, unfortunately leading the country in mortality and the prevalence of heart failure.”

Now, with his health problems now in the rear view, Corum is no longer burdened by that statistic, thanks to a tiny device that set him on a new course.

“I went, and I’m not exaggerating, I went from planning my funeral to planning vacations,” Corum exclaimed.

Dr. Yaranov suggests if you think you have a “weak heart,” it’s likely much more serious than that and you should immediately check-in with your doctor to look for solutions.

He also advises that Barostim is not for everybody, but there are plenty of new medications and advances in recent years that have proven successful against cardiovascular disease and heart failure.

Click here to sign up for our newsletter!

Click here to report a spelling or grammar error. Please include the headline.