CardioKinetix Inc. announced the completion of enrollment in Parachute China, a multi-center trial to evaluate the minimally invasive Parachute Ventricular Partitioning Device for the treatment of heart failure.

St. Jude Medical Inc. announced the first patient enrollment in the STAR-VT (Substrate Targeted Ablation using the FlexAbility Ablation Catheter System for the Reduction of VentricularTachycardia) clinical trial, a prospective, multi-center, randomized study evaluating the safety and efficacy of the FlexAbility ablation catheter in ventricular tachycardia (VT) ablation procedures.

AstraZeneca announced that the PEGASUS-TIMI 54 study, a large-scale outcomes trial involving more than 21,000 patients, successfully met its primary efficacy endpoint. The study assessed ticagrelor (Brilinta) tablets at either 60 mg twice daily or 90 mg twice daily plus low-dose aspirin for the secondary prevention of atherothrombotic events in patients who had experienced a heart attack one to three years prior to study start. The primary efficacy endpoint was a composite of cardiovascular (CV) death, myocardial infarction (MI) or stroke.

In a rural Maine county, sustained community-wide programs targeting cardiovascular risk factors and behavior changes were associated with reductions in hospitalization and death rates over a 40-year period (1970-2010) compared with the rest of the state. Substantial improvements were seen in control of hypertension, cholesterol and smoking cessation, according to a study in the January 13 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

Sunshine Heart Inc. announced the company's German Erlangen site for the OPTIONS-HF study has implanted its first patient with the C-Pulse(R) System for moderate to severe heart failure.

A study involving scientists from the University of Leicester has established a link between hypoglycaemia and increased risk of cardiovascular events and mortality in patients with diabetes.