CHICAGO (April 4, 2016) -- Patients treated with CMX-2043--an investigational drug that has previously shown some ability to protect heart muscle from damage during stenting--saw no improved protection in their kidneys compared to placebo, according to research presented at the American College of Cardiology's 65th Annual Scientific Session.
Culture
A daily dose of vitamin D3 improves heart function in people with chronic heart failure, a five-year University of Leeds research project has found.
Dr Klaus Witte, from the School of Medicine and Consultant Cardiologist at Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, led the study, known as VINDICATE.
He said: "This is a significant breakthrough for patients. It is the first evidence that vitamin D3 can improve heart function of people with heart muscle weakness - known as heart failure. These findings could make a significant difference to the care of heart failure patients."
Stem cell therapies capable of regenerating any human tissue damaged by injury, disease or ageing could be available within a few years, following landmark research led by UNSW Australia researchers.
The repair system, similar to the method used by salamanders to regenerate limbs, could be used to repair everything from spinal discs to bone fractures, and has the potential to transform current treatment approaches to regenerative medicine.
The UNSW-led research has been published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal.
Research has documented that black Americans are systematically undertreated for pain relative to white Americans, likely due to both the over-prescription and over-use of pain medications among white patients and the under-prescription of pain medications for black patients. Indeed, research has shown that black patients are undertreated for pain not only relative to white patients, but relative to World Health Organization guidelines.
Models developed by the American College of Cardiology NCDR CathPCI Registry to predict the likelihood of angioplasty patients developing acute kidney injury and acute kidney injury requiring dialysis have proven to be effective among patients in Japan. This finding suggests these models may have international application as a preventive tool, according to a study published today in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
LOS ANGELES (April 4, 2016) - An investigational stem cell therapy derived from patients' own blood marrow significantly improved outcomes in patients with severe heart failure, according to a study from the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute.
The research was presented today as a late-breaking clinical trial at the American College of Cardiology Scientific Sessions in Chicago.
Although prescribing of the fentanyl patch has improved, physicians are still failing to adhere to safe prescribing guidelines, with half of new prescriptions being written for people who have not had the required previous opioid exposure, found new research from the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada, in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) (pre-embargo link only). http://www.cmaj.ca/site/press/cmaj.150961.pdf
CHICAGO (April 4, 2016, 11 am CDT): Directors of general surgery residency programs believe that flexible work hour schedules for surgeons in training (residents) improve the continuity of patient care as well as resident training without compromising patient safety.
(Salt Lake City) - End-stage heart failure patients treated with stem cells harvested from their own bone marrow experienced 37 percent fewer cardiac events - including deaths and hospital admissions related to heart failure - than a placebo-controlled group, reports a new study. Results from ixCELL-DCM, the largest cell therapy trial for treating heart failure to date, will be presented at the 2016 American College of Cardiology annual meeting and published online in The Lancet on April 4.
A report on seven cases of severe myasthenia gravis (an autoimmune disease characterized by severe muscle weakness) suggests that autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (when a patient's own stem cells are used) may result in long-term remission that is symptom and treatment free, according to an article published online by JAMA Neurology.
The study by Harold Atkins, M.D., F.R.C.P.C., of the University of Ottawa and the Ottawa Hospital, Canada, and coauthors reports outcomes at the Ottawa Hospital from 2001 through 2014.
Atrial fibrillation increases the risk of stroke. Treatment with oral anticoagulation reduces this risk but instead increases the risk of bleeding. Today, a new blood test based tool enabling better and more individualized stroke prevention treatment is presented at a congress in Chicago, and simultaneously published in the top-ranked medical journal The Lancet.
HOUSTON - (April 4, 2016) - A simple filtration process helped Rice University researchers create flexible, wafer-scale films of highly aligned and closely packed carbon nanotubes.
Scientists at Rice, with support from Los Alamos National Laboratory, have made inch-wide films of densely packed, chirality-enriched single-walled carbon nanotubes through a process revealed today in Nature Nanotechnology.
CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Since the 1600s, chocolatiers have been perfecting the art of the bonbon, passing down techniques for crafting a perfectly smooth, even chocolaty shell.
Efmoroctocog alfa (trade name: Elocta) has been approved since November 2015 for people with type A haemophilia. This is an inherited disorder that impairs blood clotting. The German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) examined in a dossier assessment whether this new drug offers an added benefit over the appropriate comparator therapy both in prevention and in on-demand treatment. Such an added benefit cannot be derived from the dossier, however, because it contained no study data adequate for the research question.
CHICAGO (April 3, 2016) -- Patients visiting a hospital emergency department with chest pain who engaged with their physician in shared decision-making using a tool called Chest Pain Choice showed improved knowledge of their health status and follow-up care options compared with patients who received standard counseling from a physician without the use of this decision aid, according to research presented at the American College of Cardiology's 65th Annual Scientific Session.