Once a drastic measure, heart bypass is now a common surgery

PLAINSBORO, New Jersey (WPVI) -- Heart bypass surgery: What used to be an extraordinary procedure for clogged arteries is now done more than a thousand times a day. And it's still a powerful fix for ailing hearts.

"I woke up around 4 a.m. with chest discomfort, kind of tightness in the chest," recalls Hector Torres, of Plainsboro, New Jersey.

Hector Torres thought he had acid reflux, but the usual medication didn't help and the pain worsened.

"Pain in my shoulder. And then it started radiating down my left arm. I started getting nauseous," says Torres.

Suspecting a heart attack, Torres had his wife rush him to the nearest emergency room. One completely blocked artery was opened with four stents, but other blockages made bypass surgery a must too.

"We are bypassing the blockage," says Dr. Kewal Krishan, a Temple Health cardiothoracic surgeon, adding, "So that the blood can go to the heart."

Dr. Krishan considers numerous factors on deciding whether to stent or do a bypass.

There's the number of clogged arteries and the amount of blockage. The size of the blockages is also important.

"If there are lesions that are very long, like if you put a long pipe in, there are more chances that it will get clogged again," he explains.

So, a stent wouldn't be enough. Arteries that clog again after angioplasty or a stent call for bypass and so would a blockage in the left main artery, which is a primary blood supply for the heart.

Dr. Krishan says the bypasses come from segments of a patient's own arteries or veins.

"We take from your own body, from the legs and from the chest, and then pass that across that lesion," he explains. "Your heart becomes as it was like 10-15 years ago."

Patients used to spend two to three weeks in the hospital after bypass. But not anymore.

"70-80% of the patients they have seven to nine days in the hospital," Dr. Krishan says.

Most people can return to work in three weeks and do heavy work in six weeks.

Torres's specially inscribed pillow - showing the blockages and the percentages they were closed - reminds him of his incredibly close call.

"The week before that, I was celebrating my birthday and I was out there dancing,"

Dr. Krishan says many patients still see heart bypass as a big, risky surgery, but it's actually more common now than an appendectomy.