September 18, 2012 — Inpatient hospital treatment accounts for the largest proportion of healthcare spending in the United States, with the use of diagnostic imaging services such as magnetic resonance images (MRIs) frequently implicated as the probable cause. A new analysis finds that the biggest expense may not be from imaging technology, but from supplies including medical devices, such as stents and artificial joints.

September 18, 2012 — Neovasc Inc. announced that acute results from preclinical studies of its Tiara valve for the transcatheter treatment of mitral regurgitation were published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC). The study reports that the initial experience with the Tiara transcatheter mitral valve was encouraging, and that implantation of Tiara valves was feasible, relatively straightforward and resulted in a securely-implanted, well-functioning device that maintained good hemodynamics in the test animals. The study, which will be published in the Oct. 9, 2012, edition of JACC, is currently available online.

Covidien announced the launch of the Viance Crossing Catheter and Enteer Re-entry System for treating chronic total occlusions (CTOs) endovascularly. The devices are now available in the United States, the European Union (EU) and other select international markets.

September 18, 2012 — Abiomed Inc. announced it received confirmation from the American Medical Association (AMA) of three new Category I Current Procedure Terminology (CPT) codes for Impella percutaneous technologies, effective January 2013.

September 17, 2012 — The American College of Cardiology (ACC) has released the results of its 2012 Practice Census, showing that the number of physician-owned practices continues to decline, while hospital employment has nearly tripled since 2007.

ESC Heart Valve Repair Hybrid OR Clinical trial/study

Cardiologists are restricting the use of transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) to very old or very sick patients at high surgical risk, according to research presented at the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) Congress. The first results of the Transcatheter Valve Treatment (TCVT) Sentinel Pilot Registry were presented by registry chairman Professor Carlo Di Mario.

According to a study in the September issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology, overall noninvasive diagnostic imaging (NDI) costs to Medicare Part B dropped 21% from 2006 to 2010. The study reveals that medical imaging is not a driver of escalating Medicare costs.

The Cardiovascular Research Foundation (CRF) announced the late-breaking trials and first report investigations that will be presented at next month's Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics (TCT) 2012 scientific symposium. TCT, the world's premier educational meeting specializing in interventional cardiovascular medicine, will take place Oct. 22-26 in Miami, Fla.

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