Intravenous contrast media (typically iohexol or iodixanol) used in computed tomography (CT) does not appear to be associated with chronic kidney disease, dialysis, kidney transplant or acute kidney injury, despite long-held fears to the contrary. The results of the largest controlled study of acute kidney injury following contrast media administration in the emergency department were published online in Annals of Emergency Medicine ("Risk of Acute Kidney Injury Following Intravenous Contrast Media Administration").


The movement from paper electrocardiogram (ECG) review to electronic ECG management systems in the past decade has helped improve efficiency and complete the patient electronic medical record (EMR). Current ECG management systems now offer improved workflow efficiencies, greater interoperability and integration into cardiovascular information systems (CVIS), vendor-agnostic integration of multiple vendor’s ECG system data, and mobile access to waveforms.

 


Hartzler Interventional Cardiology Symposium 2017


Analytics in the past couple years have moved far beyond the simple dashboards used by many cardiology department administrators to dedicated, complex, powerful data mining and interpretation software. Patient data is increasingly concentrated in the electronic medical record (EMR). More data is now collected by the diagnostic testing systems and imaging equipment. Department, hospital and healthcare system data on billing, patient throughput, scheduling, inventory and expenses are tallied electronically. These data offer new tools for department directors to improve efficiency. 


IBA Molecular has successfully completed its acquisition of Mallinckrodt Nuclear Imaging, announced in August 2016, following the receipt of regulatory approvals.

DAIC has worked hard to bring useful technology news and resources to our readers. While we conduct reader surveys and speak to readers at site visits and conferences, one of the clearest views we have of reader interests is based on what they are reading on our website, e-newsletters and digital editions. We have responded to these analytics in what we publish and how we cover new cardiovascular technology. The result has been a big increase in our online readership over the past year. For the first time, DAIC’s website broke 1 million pageviews in November 2016.

HyperMed Imaging Inc. announced that it has received clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the company’s new medical imaging device called HyperView. The HyperView product is a handheld, battery operated, portable diagnostic imaging device that is used to assess tissue oxygenation without contacting the patient.  The product is intended for use by physicians and healthcare professionals as a noninvasive tissue oxygenation measurement system that reports an approximate value of oxygen saturation (O2Sat), oxyhemoglobin level (Oxy) and deoxyhemoglobin level (Deoxy) in superficial tissue.

Researchers at Binghamton University, State University of New York have devised a new way to protect personal electronic health records using a patient’s own heartbeat.

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