April 5, 2017 — GE Healthcare has signed an agreement with HealthTrust, a group purchasing organization headquartered in Nashville, Tenn., to provide both low-energy (SPECT) and high-energy (PET) radiopharmaceuticals to HealthTrust members across the United States. The agreement commenced on March 1, 2017.
This week the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) convened a panel of the Medicare Evidence Development and Coverage Advisory Committee (MEDCAC) to examine which health outcomes in studies of heart failure treatment technologies should be of interest to CMS. The panel also assessed the growing challenges associated with the changing landscape of evidence generated prior to market authorizations of new and innovative technology. While MEDCAC panels do not make coverage determinations, CMS does benefit from their guidance.
A multi-center study done in the United States and Canada may have global applicability for families with children afflicted with cardiomyopathy. Findings from this large National Institutes of Health (NIH) study, which have important implications in how to treat two types of dilated cardiomyopathy in children, have been published in Circulation Heart Failure, an official journal of the American Heart Association. The paper, representing findings from nearly 100 pediatric cardiology centers, is titled “Differences in Presentation and Outcomes Between Children with Familial Dilated Cardiomyopathy and Children With Idiopathic Dilated Cardiomyopathy: A Report From the Pediatric Cardiomyopathy Registry Study Group.”
Cardiovascular Systems Inc., in partnership with the Cardiovascular Research Foundation (CRF), announced the first subject enrolled in its ECLIPSE clinical trial. The subject was treated by Richard Shlofmitz, M.D., interventional cardiologist and director of the Department of Cardiology at St. Francis Hospital, Roslyn, N.Y. Shlofmitz also treated subjects in CSI’s ORBIT II and COAST clinical studies.
The American Society of Echocardiography (ASE) and the European Association of Cardiovascular Imaging (EACVI) have released a new joint document updating guidance for how best to use echocardiography to assess the growing number of patients with aortic stenosis (AS). The paper, Recommendations on the Echocardiographic Assessment of Aortic Valve Stenosis: A Focused Update from the European Association of Cardiovascular Imaging (EACVI) and the American Society of Echocardiography (ASE), will appear in the April issue of the Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography (JASE).
There is no evidence that adding a new cholesterol-lowering drug to treatment with a statin causes memory loss or other problems with cognition or thinking, according to findings from the EBBINGHAUS study. The research from the largest, most rigorously designed study to address this issue to date was presented at the American College of Cardiology’s 66th Annual Scientific Session, March 17-19 in Washington, D.C.
https://www.dicardiology.com/content/new-protocol-henry-ford-hospital-dramatically-increases-heart-attack-survival-ratesThe influence of cardiac arrest and cardiogenic shock on outcomes of patients with ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) has not been completely studied. Researchers at the Minneapolis Heart Institute Foundation (MHIF) conducted a study to determine the incidence, characteristics and outcomes of STEMI complicated by cardiac arrest with or without cardiogenic shock.
Hospitals can dramatically increase heart attack survival rates in patients suffering cardiogenic shock by providing rapid hemodynamic support before treating the cause of a heart attack, according to a new analysis that included more than 15,000 patients across the United States.
