MedicalResearch.com - Latest news, interviews, and insights into medical research, health and wellness, fitness and addiction.
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, Lipids, Stanford / 04.12.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Fatima Rodriguez, MD, MPH Division of Cardiovascular Medicine and Cardiovascular Institute Stanford University Stanford, CA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: The 2013 ACC/AHA cholesterol management guidelines emphasized that high-risk patients with atherosclerotic disease should be on high-intensity statins. We sought to determine how these guidelines are being adopted at the Veterans Affairs (VA) Health System and to identify treatment gaps. Our main findings were that the use of high-intensity statins increased from 23 to 35% following the guideline release for these high-risk patients. However, high-intensity statin use was lowest in Hispanics and Native Americans. Women, older adults, and patients with peripheral arterial and cerebrovascular disease were also less likely to undergo statin intensification after the release of the guideline. We also noted geographic and institutional differences across VA hospitals in rates of high-intensity statin use for secondary prevention. (more…)
Author Interviews, Exercise - Fitness, Heart Disease / 03.12.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Bjarne M. Nes, PhD K.G. Jebsen Center for Exercise in Medicine, Department of Circulation and Medical Imaging Norwegian University of Science and Technology Trondheim, Norway. MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: It is well known that cardiorespiratory fitness is an important predictor of future cardiovascular disease risk. Still, fitness levels are rarely measured in clinical practice, likely because of costly and time-consuming procedures that requires quite a lot of training. Therefore, we wanted to test the ability of a simple estimation of fitness, from a so-called non-exercise algorithm, to identify individuals at high and low risk of cardiovascular mortality. We tested fitness alone and in combination with traditional risk factors such as high blood pressure, cholesterol, smoking and family history of heart disease and diabetes, among 38,480 men and women from the Nord-Trondelag Health Study in Norway. We found that estimated fitness strongly predicts premature deaths from all causes and that traditional clinical risk factors added little above and beyond fitness in terms of predicting risk. (more…)
Alcohol, Author Interviews, CT Scanning, Heart Disease / 02.12.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Pál Maurovich-Horvat MD, PhD, MPH, FSCCT Assistant Professor of Cardiology Director of the MTA-SE Cardiovascular Imaging Research Group Heart and Vascular Center, Semmelweis University Budapest, Hungary MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Several studies have been published on alcohol consumption and its association with the presence of coronary artery disease, however the data remains controversial. Some studies suggested that moderate alcohol consumption reduces the risk of heart disease and others found no protective effect. Our study is the first investigation that aims to assess the effect of alcohol on the coronary arteries using coronary CT angiography. We found no association between regular alcohol consumption and the presence of coronary disease. (more…)
Author Interviews, BMJ, Exercise - Fitness, Heart Disease / 30.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Emmaneul Stamatakis PhD, MSc, BSc Associate Professor | NHMRC Senior Research Fellow Charles Perkins Centre, Prevention Research Collaboration School of Public Health, Sydney Medical School The University of Sydney MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We examined the association between participation in different sports and risk of death during subsequent decade in a large sample of >80k adults aged 30 and over who lived in Scotland and England between 2994 and 2008 . We found the following significant reduction in risk of dying from all causes among participants compared with non-participants: cycling 15%, aerobics 27%, swimming 28%, racquet balls 47%; there was no significant reduction in mortality for running/jogging and football/rugby. We also found the following significant reduction in risk of dying from cardiovascular diseases: aerobics 36%, swimming 41%, racquet balls 56%; there were no significant reduction in mortality for running, cycling and football/rugby. Results in both cases were adjusted for the potential confounders: age, sex, chronic conditions, alcohol drinking and smoking habits, mental health, obesity, education level, doctor-diagnosed CVD, cancer, weekly volume of other physical activity besides the sport (including walking and domestic activity. (more…)
Author Interviews, CMAJ, Heart Disease, Stroke / 27.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Tony Antoniou, PhD Research Scholar Department of Family and Community Medicine and a Scientist Keenan Research Centre of the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute St. Michael's Hospital Assistant Professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine and Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Dabigatran etexilate is an anticoagulant that is commonly used for stroke prevention in patients with atrial fibrillation. Absorption of dabigatran etexilate is opposed by intestinal P-glycoprotein, an efflux transporter. Once absorbed, dabigatran etexilate is converted to its active form by carboxylesterase enzymes. Unlike other statins, simvastatin and lovastatin can inhibit P-glycoprotein and carboxylesterase. This may result in increased absorption of dabigatran etexilate, thereby increasing the risk of bleeding. Conversely, inhibition of carboxylesterase may decrease the effectiveness of dabigatran etexilate. (more…)
AHA Journals, Author Interviews, Gender Differences, Heart Disease, Surgical Research / 27.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Stefano Savonitto  Director, Division of Cardiology Manzoni Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Over the last 15 years, there has been a shift from fibrinolytic therapy for STEMI to primary angioplasty, which required a re-organization of the whole STEMI treatment network. Besides the higher reperfusion efficiency of primary angioplasty, as compared to lytic therapy, it has been a global upgrade of the STEMI care system that has reduced the rate of no reperfusion. Elderly patients and women (who are, on average, also older than men) had theoretically the most to gain from this shift, but little data were available to assess this benefit. In the present paper, we have shown that “lack of reperfusion” was reduced dramatically across all age groups and in both sexes, with a progressive and uniform increase in primary angioplasty, and a significant reduction in mortality. Almost as expected, elderly women were the category with the most relevant mortality benefit. Nevertheless, after adjustment for age and other confounders, women continue to experience a higher mortality as compared to men. In the discussion of the paper, we propose some hypotheses for this persistently higher mortality in women. (more…)
Author Interviews, BMJ, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Heart Disease, Nutrition / 25.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Qi Sun Sc.D, M.D., M.M.S. Assistant Professor in the Department of Nutrition Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Heath Boston MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Interpretation of existing human study data regarding saturated fat intake in relation to heart disease risk is quite confusing and distorted in certain publications. It is a fact that, depending on data analysis strategies, the effects of saturated fats may depend on which macronutrients they replace. For example, substituting saturated fats for refined carbohydrates will not lead to an elevated risk of heart disease because both nutrients are harmful whereas replacing saturated fats with good polyunsaturated fats results in risk reduction. In our current analysis, we clearly demonstrated that when total saturated fatty acids were replaced by polyunsaturated fatty acids, monounsaturated fatty acids, whole grain carbohydrates, and plant-based proteins, the diabetes risk would decrease. Furthermore, we showed that major individual saturated fatty acids were all associated with an elevated heart disease risk. (more…)
Author Interviews, Biomarkers, BMJ, Heart Disease / 25.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Archana Singh-Manoux, PhD Research Professor (Directeur de Recherche) Epidemiology of ageing & age-related diseases INSERM,France MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: A recent metabolomics study examined 106 biomarkers and found alpha-1-acid glycoprotein (AGP), an acute phase protein, to be the strongest predictor of five-year mortality. It is also unknown how well AGP compares with other sensitive, dynamic, and commonly measured markers of systemic inflammation, such as CRP and IL-6, as a predictor of mortality. We examined the association of these three inflammatory markers with short- and long-term mortality in a large sample of middle-aged adults, followed for 17 years. Our analysis of all-cause, cancer and cardiovascular mortality suggests that for all these outcomes IL-6 may be a better prognostic marker, both in the short and the long-term. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, JAMA / 22.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Vinay Kini, MD, MS Division of Cardiovascular Medicine Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania The Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics University of Pennsylvania Philadelphia MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Recent studies have shown that use of cardiac stress tests has declined by about 25% among Medicare beneficiaries and by about 50% in Kaiser Permanente over the last several years. However, the reasons for these declines is not well understood. Decreases in the use of stress testing could be due to dissemination of appropriate use criteria and other clinical practice guidelines, advances in preventive care, reductions in reimbursement for testing, or other health system organizational characteristics. Therefore, our goal was to determine whether similar declines in testing are observed among a nationally representative cohort of commercially insured patients. We identified over 2 million stress tests performed among 33 million members of the commercial insurance company, and found that there was a 3% increase in the overall use of stress testing in this cohort between 2005 and 2012. Declines in the use of nuclear SPECT tests were offset by increases in the use of stress echocardiography, exercise electrocardiography, and newer stress test modalities such as coronary computed tomography angiography. The largest increase in use of testing was seen among younger individuals - there was a 60% increase in use of testing among patients aged 25-34, and a 30% increase among individuals aged 35-44. (more…)
Author Interviews, Critical Care - Intensive Care - ICUs, Emergency Care, Heart Disease, Kidney Disease / 21.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Paul E Ronksley, PhD Assistant Professor Department of Community Health Sciences Cumming School of Medicine University of Calgary Calgary Canada MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Prior studies have observed high resource use among patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD), which is related to the medical complexity of this patient population. However, there has been limited exploration of how patients with CKD use the emergency department (ED) and whether utilization is associated with disease severity. While the ED is essential for providing urgent or emergent care, identifying ways of improving ED efficiency and decreasing wait times has been recognized as a priority in multiple countries. Improving coordination and management of care for patients with multiple chronic conditions (the norm for CKD) in an outpatient setting may meet health care needs and ultimately improve patient experience and outcomes while reducing the burden currently placed on the ED. However, this requires an understanding of ED use among patients with CKD and the proportion of use that is amenable to outpatient care. Using a large population-based cohort we explored how rates of ED use vary by kidney disease severity and the proportion of these events that are potentially preventable by high quality ambulatory care. We identified all adults (≥18 years) with eGFR<60 mL/min/1.73m2 (including dialysis-dependent patients) in Alberta, Canada between April 1, 2010 and March 31, 2011. Patients with CKD were linked to administrative data to capture clinical characteristics and frequency of ED encounters, and followed until death or end of study (March 31, 2013). Within each CKD category we calculated adjusted rates of overall  emergency departmentt use, as well as rates of potentially preventable ED encounters (defined by 4 CKD-specific ambulatory care sensitive conditions (ACSCs); heart failure, hyperkalemia, volume overload, malignant hypertension). (more…)
Author Interviews, Gender Differences, Heart Disease, Surgical Research / 21.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr James Spratt Bsc, MD, FRCP, FESC, FACC Spire Edinburgh Hospitals and Spire Murrayfield Edinburgh Spire Shawfair Park Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Gender differences exist between male and female patients following routine PCI but data regarding these differences in Chronic Total Occlusions (CTO) Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI) is limited. We maintain a dedicated national (United Kingdom) prospective CTO database contributed to by dedicated CTO PCI operators (lifetime CTO PCI >300). We retrospectively analysed this database from 2011-2015 to compare outcomes and characteristics of male versus female patients undergoing CTO PCI. We attempted to limit the bias of this observational study by propensity matched analysis. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, JAMA / 21.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Doug Owens MD former USPSTF Task Force member Professor at Stanford University Henry J. Kaiser, Jr. Professor Director of the Center for Health Policy Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies Center for Primary Care and Outcomes Research Department of Medicine and School of Medicine Stanford MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for review and statement? Response: Cardiovascular disease is serious—it can lead to heart attacks and strokes, and is responsible for one in every three adult deaths in the U.S. People with no signs or symptoms and no past history of cardiovascular disease can still be at risk. Fortunately, some people can benefit from taking a medication called statins to reduce that risk. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, Menopause, Weight Research, Women's Heart Health / 20.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Somwail Rasla, MD Internal Medicine Resident Memorial Hospital of Rhode Island Brown University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Weight cycling has been studied as a possible risk factors for all-cause mortality and was found to be insignificant in some studies and significant in other studies when adjusted to age and timing of when the weight cycling occurred. It was proposed that weight cycling may increase risk of chronic inflammation by which weight cycling was considered to be a risk factor for increased morbidity and all cause mortalities. Other studies have reported that frequent weight cycling was associated with shorter telomere length, which is a risk factor for several comorbidities including CHD. Earlier studies showed that weight cycling has an association with increase in size of adipocytes as well as fluctuation of serum cholesterol, triglycerides, glucose, insulin, and glucagon which may contribute to the increased incidence of diabetes. Alternatively, in the nurses’ health study , weight cycling was not predictive of cardiovascular or total mortality. (more…)
Author Interviews, Emory, Exercise - Fitness, Geriatrics, Heart Disease, Lifestyle & Health / 18.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Vasiliki Georgiopoulou MD MPH PhD Assistant Professor of Medicine (Cardiology) Emory University School of Medicine MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Although existing evidence suggests that more exercise capacity is associated with lower risk of CV disease and death, we don’t know whether more exercise capacity would lead to lower risk for heart failure also. This would be especially important for older adults, who are the group with the highest risk to develop heart failure. We used the data of a cohort study to test this association. The exercise capacity was evaluated by a walking test that is easy to perform – the long-distance corridor walk test. We observed that older adults who were able to complete the test had the lowest risk to develop heart failure and the lowest mortality rates, when compared with those who were not able to complete the test and those who could not do the test for medical reasons. We also observed that changes in exercise capacity 4 years later did not predict subsequent heart failure or mortality – perhaps because less fit older patients had already developed heart failure or had died. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Heart Disease, NEJM, Surgical Research / 17.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Mandeep R. Mehra, MD, FACC, FESC, FHFSA, FRCP Medical Director, Brigham and Women’s Hospital Heart and Vascular Center Executive Director, Center for Advanced Heart Disease Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School Editor in Chief, The Journal of Heart and Lung Transplantation Brigham and Women's Hospital Boston, MA Mandeep R. Mehra, MD, FACC, FESC, FHFSA, FRCP Medical Director, Brigham and Women’s Hospital Heart and Vascular Center Executive Director, Center for Advanced Heart Disease Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School Editor in Chief, The Journal of Heart and Lung Transplantation Brigham and Women's Hospital Boston, MA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: 10% of patients with heart failure and a reduced ejection fraction transition into Advanced Stages of disease where they become unresponsive to life prolonging traditional medications. Such patients typically require intravenous inotropic therapy to preserve cardiac function but most remain profoundly limited in their quality of life. In such cases a heart transplant is desirable but this is an option for only a few patients. Left Ventricular Assist Devices (LVADs) have become the mainstay for treating such patients either while they await a transplant or as a permanent option. However, there are challenges leading to infections, strokes, bleeding and most importantly pump malfunction due to thrombosis of the LVAD itself. The HeartMate 3 LVAD is a centrifugal pump that is designed to overcome the problem of pump thrombosis by virtue of 3 engineering attributes: (a) A frictionless rotor that is based on a fully magnetically levitated platform (b) wide blood flow passages that reduce red cell destruction and (c) an artificial intrinsic pulse that prevents stasis of blood within the pump. (more…)
Author Interviews, CT Scanning, Heart Disease, JAMA, Women's Heart Health / 16.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Maryam Kavousi MD, PhD, FESC Assistant Professor Department of Epidemiology Erasmus University Medical Center Rotterdam The Netherlands  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: The most recent American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association (ACC/AHA) cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention guidelines recommend statins for a larger proportion of populations. Notably, a large group of women are categorized as low CVD risk by the guidelines and would therefore not typically qualify for intensive management of their standard risk factors. Coronary artery calcium (CAC) scanning allows for the detection of subclinical coronary atherosclerosis and is viewed as the vessel’s memory of lifetime exposure to risk factors. We therefore aimed to address the utility of CAC as a potential tool for refining CVD risk assessment in asymptomatic women at low CVD risk based on the new guidelines. This study involved data on 6,739 low-risk women from 5 population-based cohort studies across the United States and Europe. We found that CAC was present in 36% of low-risk women and was associated with increased risk of CVD. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease / 16.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dragana Radovanovic, MD Head of AMIS Plus Data Center Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Prevention Institute (EBPI) University of Zurich Zurich Switzerland MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Although patients presenting with new or presumed new left bundle branch block (LBBB) represent a minority of the patients admitted with suspected acute myocardial infarction (AMI), they remain a challenging and unresolved diagnostic and therapeutic dilemma in routine clinical practice. Large trials such as PLATO or SHOCK have evaluated AMI therapy and considered ST-elevation MI (STEMI) and new LBBB as a single diagnostic group. Currently, European and American guidelines differ. European guidelines recommend that reperfusion therapy should be considered promptly, preferably using emergency coronary angiography with a view to primary PCI in patients with clinical suspicion of ongoing myocardial ischemia and new or presumed new LBBB. However, the ACCF/AHA guidelines are much less enthusiastic and recommend that patients with new or presumed new LBBB should not be considered as diagnostic of AMI in isolation and consequently provide little guidance on how to react if biomarkers are elevated. Routine clinical practice documentation of prior ECGs, which would confirm whether the LBBB was new or not, is often missing increasing the uncertainty on how to treat these patients. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Heart Disease / 16.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Anand M. Irimpen MD Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine Tulane University Medical Center New Orleans, LA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We did this study to look at the incidence of heart attacks post Katrina. There had been no long-term data on patients having heart attacks post major disaster and hence we decided to investigate this issue. The main findings are that there is a three-fold increase in heart attacks post Katrina compared to pre - Katrina. There was a higher incidence of hypertension, diabetes, hypercholesterolemia and smoking in the post-Katrina group compared to the pre-Katrina group. (more…)
Author Interviews, Diabetes, Heart Disease, Rheumatology / 16.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Prof.dr. M.T. Nurmohamed, MD, PhD and Rabia Agca MD Dept. of Rheumatology | VU University Medical Center Amsterdam Rheumatology & immunology Center EULAR center of excellence in rheumatology MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: About 20 years ago the increased mortality in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) was well known, but not the causes. In daily clinical practice it seemed that RA patients more frequently suffered from myocardial infarctions than general population persons. Therefore, we started this study more than 15 years ago as at that time there were only sparse data with respect to cardiovascular morbidity in rheumatoid arthritis. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, Heart Disease, JAMA, Pharmacology / 16.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Paul J. Hauptman, MD Professor Internal Medicine, Division of Cardiology Health Management & Policy, School of Public Health MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We decided to evaluate the cost of generic heart failure medications after an uninsured patient of ours reported that he could not fill a prescription for digoxin because of the cost for a one month's supply: $100. We called the pharmacy in question and confirmed the pricing. At that point we decided to explore this issue more closely. We called 200 retail pharmacies in the bi-state, St. Louis metropolitan area, 175 of which provided us with drug prices for three generic heart failure medications: digoxin, carvedilol and lisinopril. We found significant variability in the cash price for these medications. Combined prices for the three drugs ranged from $12-$400 for 30 day supply and $30-$1,100 for 90 day supply. The variability was completely random, not a function of pharmacy type, zip code, median annual income, region or state. In fact, pricing even varied among different retail stores of the same pharmacy chain. (more…)
Author Interviews, Critical Care - Intensive Care - ICUs, Education, Heart Disease, Outcomes & Safety / 15.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Sean van Diepen, MD, FRCPC Assistant Professor of Critical Care Medicine and Cardiology Coronary Intensive Care Unit Co-Director University of Alberta Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Studies have documented a wide variation in CCU admission rates for patients hospitalized with acute coronary syndromes (ACS) or heart failure (HF). The reasons underpinning these differences are incompletely understood and little is known about the associations between hospital type, resource utilization, and clinical outcomes among patients admitted to the CCU with an ACS or HF. In a national cohort of 220,759 patients, we observed that CCU admission rates varied by hospital type: 41% in teaching hospitals, 29.9% in large teaching hospitals, 42.6% in medium community hospitals and13.7% in small community hospitals. The percentage of patients that did not receive critical care therapies within the first 2 days of admission were: 35.5%, 58.0%, 83.3% and 95.6%, respectively. Compared large community hospitals, community hospitals all had higher adjusted in hospital mortality rates. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, JACC, Surgical Research / 15.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Opeyemi O. Fadahunsi, MBBS, MPH Department of Medicine Reading Health System West Reading, Pennsylvania MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) is a minimally invasive approach to managing symptomatic severe aortic stenosis in patients who have a high surgical risk or are deemed to be inoperable. One of the most frequent complications is development of conduction abnormalities requiring permanent pacemaker placement. We compared clinical outcomes in patients requiring permanent pacemaker placement post-TAVR to those not requiring a pacemaker using a large US database called the STS/ACC TVT RegistryTM . We used real-world data of patients undergoing TAVR in the US at 229 sites between November 2011 and September 2014. The frequency of pacemaker placement within 30 days post-TAVR was 6.7% (651 of 9,785 patients). Those who needed a pacemaker within 30 days post-TAVR had longer hospital and intensive care unit stays compared to those who did not. Furthermore, those who needed a pacemaker had a higher risk of death from any cause at one year compared to those who did not get a pacemaker. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cannabis, Gender Differences, Heart Disease / 14.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Amitoj Singh MD Chief Cardiology Fellow St. Luke’s University Health Bethlehem, Pennsylvania MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Marijuana use in steadily increasing and it is the most commonly used illicit drug in the US and worldwide. There has been a recent increase in reports of heart and vascular complications associated with its use. These include Myocardial infarctions, stroke and takotsubo. We had two questions that we wanted to answer with our study: a) Is there an association between marijuana use and development of Transient Regional Ventricular Ballooning [TVRB] (aka Stress Cardiomyopathy /Broken Heart Syndrome/ Takotsubo)? b) If the above is true, what are the differences between Marijuana users (MU) and Non Marijuana Users (NMU) who developed Stress Cardiomyopathy. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, Lipids, NEJM, Pharmacology / 14.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Kevin Fitzgerald, Ph.D. Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Cambridge, MA 02142 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Inclisiran (ALN-PCSsc) is a subcutaneously administered RNAi therapeutic targeting PCSK9 in development for the treatment of hypercholesterolemia. The Phase 1 trial of inclisiran was conducted in the U.K. as a randomized, single-blind, placebo controlled, single ascending-and multi-dose, subcutaneous dose-escalation study in 69 volunteer subjects with elevated baseline LDL-C (≥ 100 mg/dL). The primary objective of the study was to evaluate the safety, side effect profile, and pharmacodynamics effects of inclisiran. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, Pediatrics, University of Pennsylvania / 14.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Maryam Y. Naim, MD Pediatric Cardiac Intensive Care Physician The Cardiac Center The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Perelman School of Medicine The University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?  Response: In adults bystander compression only CPR has similar outcomes to bystander conventional COR therefore the The American Heart Association recommends untrained lay rescuers perform compression only CPR in adults that have an out of hospital cardiac arrest. In children respiratory arrests are more common therefore conventional CPR with chest compressions and rescue breaths are recommended for out of hospital cardiac arrest. (more…)
Author Interviews, Blood Pressure - Hypertension, Heart Disease, JACC, Race/Ethnic Diversity, UT Southwestern / 13.11.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Wanpen Vongpatanasin, M.D. Professor of Medicine Norman & Audrey Kaplan Chair in Hypertension Fredric L. Coe Professorship in Nephrolithiasis and Mineral Metabolism Research Director, Hypertension Section, Cardiology Division, UT Southwestern Medical Center Dallas, TX 75390-8586 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Aortic stiffness is known to be associated with cardiovascular disease, including heart attack, stroke, and heart failure, possibly related to increase afterload to the left ventricle. Previous studies have not directly assessed proximal aortic function among ethnic minorities in the United States. We evaluated the multiethnic, population-based Dallas Heart Study participants (N=2544, 54.2% women, 49.7% Black) who underwent cardiovascular magnetic resonance imaging (CMR) at 1.5 Tesla. Aortic stiffness and characteristic impedance (Zc) were determined from aortic arch PWV and lumen area measurements. Linear regression was used to evaluate ethnic differences in proximal aortic wall stiffness using aortic arch PWV and Zc as dependent variables with and without adjustment for traditional cardiovascular risk factors. (more…)
Author Interviews, Exercise - Fitness, Heart Disease, Lifestyle & Health / 31.10.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Ulrik Wisløff, PhD Professor, Head of K.G. Jebsen Center for Exercise in Medicine Department of Circulation and Medical Imaging Norwegian University of Science and Technology Norway MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Prolonged time spent sedentary on a daily basis is detrimental for general health and is associated with increased risk of developing and dying from lifestyle related diseases such as cardiovascular disease – even in those following todays advice for physical activity given by health authorities worldwide. Number of hours spent inactive tend to increase with increased age. A person’s fitness level is regarded the best predictor of future health. We tested, in older adults (aged 70-77 years old) whether meeting physical activity recommendations and/or having high age-specific fitness level attenuated the adverse effect of prolonged sedentary time on cardiovascular risk factor clustering. Main finding was that high age-specific fitness level fully attenuated the adverse effect of prolonged sedentary time on clustering of cardiovascular risk factors, independent of meeting the physical activity recommendation in older adults. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, Surgical Research / 30.10.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Prof. Lars Wallentin MD Department of Medical Sciences, Cardiology Uppsala Clinical Research Center Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The FRISC2 study was performed 1996 – 1998 and reported 1999 for the first time a significant reduction in death and myocardial infarction by early invasive compared to non-invasive treatment strategy in patients with non-ST-elevation acute coronary syndrome (NSTE-ACS). These pivotal results have been the basis for the current international treatment guidelines recommending an early invasive treatment strategy in patients with NSTE-ACS and elevated troponin and/or other indicators of a raised risk. Still there are remaining controversies concerning the long-term effects, the appropriate selection of patients for this approach and the opportunities for a more personalised approach to early invasive procedures. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, JACC, Medical Imaging / 29.10.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Kristina H. Haugaa, MD, PhD, FESC Ida Skrinde Leren MD, PhD Department of Cardiology and Center for Cardiological Innovation, Oslo University Hospital, Rikshospitalet Oslo, Norway MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC) is an inheritable cardiomyopathy, predisposing to life-threatening arrhythmias. Ventricular arrhythmias are frequent in ARVC patients and importantly, arrhythmias may occur also before evident structural changes are seen, making risk stratification challenging. Additional tools are needed to detect early disease and to optimize medication and timing of implantation of a cardioverter defibrillator (ICD). We aimed to explore early markers of ARVC disease and their association with previous ventricular arrhythmias. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, JACC, Surgical Research / 28.10.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Anna Franzone, MD and Prof.Thomas Pilgrim, MD Department of Cardiology Bern University Hospital INSELSPITAL Bern, Switzerland MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Surgical aortic valve replacement is the therapeutic standard for patients with pure native aortic regurgitation (AR). However, transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) is emerging as a novel treatment option for patients deemed inoperable or at high-risk for surgery because of advanced age and multiple comorbidities. We performed a systematic review and meta-analysis including 237 patients with pure native AR undergoing TAVI across 13 studies. The primary study endpoint, all-cause mortality at 30-day, ranged from 0% up to 30% with a summary estimate rate of 7% . The occurrence of complications such as the need for a second valve implantation was relatively low as well as the rates of other endpoints (cerebrovascular events, major bleeding and vascular complications). (more…)