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Journal and News Scan
Congenitally Corrected Transposition Cardiac Surgery: Society of Thoracic Surgeons Database Analysis
November 17, 2022
Submitted by: Cameron Lind
Contemporary surgical practices for the management of congenitally corrected transposition of the great arteries (ccTGA) have not previously been described in multicenter analyses. This study defines contemporary outcomes in a multicenter cohort, concluding that patients with ccTGA remain a cohort with significant diversity in the operations used and substantial operative mortality and morbidity.
November 17, 2022
Submitted by: Wei-Guo Ma
Pirruccello and associates from Massachusetts General Hospital developed a prediction model for ascending aortic diameter in a cohort of 30,018 asymptomatic individuals based on eleven variables: age (years), gender, body mass index (kg/m2), heart rate (bpm), systolic and diastolic blood pressure (mm Hg), height (cm), weight (kg), and the presence or absence of a diagnosis of diabetes, hypertension, or hyperlipidemia. The area under the receiver operator characteristic curve ranged from 0.77 to 0.81 for identifying individuals with an ascending aortic diameter 4 cm or greater in validation cohorts. This is an important step in identifying early signs of ascending thoracic aortic disease, a common cause of sudden death in the U.S.
November 14, 2022
Submitted by: Aristotle Protopapas
Quite possibly, this manuscript is projected to have the highest impact on patient care and industry for the immediate future. It provides an unusually clear narrative, and findings of a large international randomized clinical trial assert that a good quality venous conduit renders bypass superior to endovascular treatment in infrainguinal critical limb-threatening ischemia.
November 11, 2022
Submitted by: Cameron Lind
According to results of the STRESS trial, infants undergoing heart surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass did not have a lower chance of a bad outcome when administered with the steroid methylprednisolone, compared to the placebo. This trial was part of an initiative to develop a more reliable method of conducting clinical trials involving pediatric heart surgery patients.
November 11, 2022
Submitted by: Cameron Lind
Before a Belizean hospital’s partnership with Atrium Health Sanger Heart & Vascular Institute, local patients would have to travel out of the country for cardiac surgical care, which was cost prohibitive for many. Now, surgeons travel to Belize six times a year to perform cardiac catheterizations and other heart surgeries, and to train local doctors. The program is currently celebrating its tenth year in operation and continues to make lifesaving care more accessible in Belize.
November 11, 2022
Submitted by: Cameron Lind
This study assessed the use of regional analgesia in the reduction of postoperative opioid use in patients undergoing a sternotomy. Researchers used factors such as amount of opioids used, pain scores, and recovery time to determine if the method was effective. In the first seventy-two hours postoperatively, recovery checkpoints were similar between the two groups, and the study determined that regional analgesia did not reduce the amount of opioids administered in this short postoperative period.
November 11, 2022
Submitted by: Cameron Lind
Christiaan Barnard, who led the team for the first ever human-to-human heart transplant in 1967, would have turned one hundred on November 8. In addition to pioneering the heart transplant, the South African doctor made strides in intensive-care nursing to open heart surgery patients, developed UCT heart valves, and introduced new techniques in congenital heart surgery.
November 4, 2022
Submitted by: Cameron Lind
New data, to be presented at the American Heart Association’s annual meeting November 5-7, 2022, shows that hearts from COVID-19 positive donors may be as safe to transplant as those from donors without the virus. Although longer-term studies are needed, this new information could help manage the current shortage of available donor organs for people in need of a transplantation.
November 4, 2022
Submitted by: Cameron Lind
A wireless pacemaker device used to measure cardiac pathologies in rodents may be able to replace wired pacemakers in human patients. The device is digitally manufactured and fully customizable, using optogenetics to target light-sensitive proteins and disrupt arrythmias. Since the device is battery-free, it would not have to be replaced as frequently. Researchers say the next step is the translate the device into larger animal subjects for testing.
November 4, 2022
Submitted by: Cameron Lind
Although equitable access to care is critical to proper surgical lung cancer management, quality measures (QMs) that assess preoperative access to care are lacking. This study determined the relationship between meeting several preoperative QMs and various short- and long-term outcomes. Adherence to all QMs improved overall survival, but various factors including race and distance to hospital affected the ability to meet QMs.