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Journal and News Scan
A Columbia University cardiologist calls out a lack of diversity in respected medical journal editorial boards. His analysis demonstrates that as of October 2020, of fifty-one editorial board members at the New England Journal of Medicine, just one was Black and one was Hispanic, four were East Asian, and two were South Asian. Of the forty-nine editorial board members at JAMA, two were Black, two were Hispanic, three were East Asian, and one was South Asian. No board member at either publication was Native American.
This scientific statement is a granular contribution to a major cardiovascular issue, illuminating nuances of the "generally recognized as safe" (GRAS) FDA designation. One would expect the relevant Thoracic Associations in North America and Europe to contribute to this debate.
A new study recently published in JTCVS found that virtual-assisted lung mapping 2.0—a novel preoperative bronchoscopic lung mapping technique—can facilitate successful resections for deep pulmonary nodules, overcoming the limitations of conventional virtual-assisted lung mapping. The technique combines the multiple dye marks of conventional virtual-assisted lung mapping with intrabronchial microcoils to navigate thoracoscopic deep lung resection.
New findings published in the American Journal of Cardiology posit that transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) and surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) are associated with similar short-term outcomes among pediatric patients presenting with congenital heart disease (CHD). However, SAVR patients in the study had “significantly” longer ICU stays and hospitalization times and were more likely to require medications to control their blood pressure following the procedure.
A study, published on June 9 in the Journal of Cardiac Failure, shows heart failure patients who are unvaccinated against COVID-19 are three times more likely to die if infected with the virus compared to fully vaccinated and boosted heart failure patients. The study's corresponding author Anurhada Lala, MD, Director of Heart Failure Research and an Associate Professor of Medicine (Cardiology) at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, said in a press release that these findings can be useful to help educate reluctant patients and encourage them to follow through with full vaccination, including boosters, with the goal of improving their chances of survival.
In September 2015, the United Nations introduced Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to address persistent gaps in global health by 2030. Of the seventeen SDGs, the authors posit how fifteen goals can be directly or indirectly influenced by the cardiothoracic community. Amid the growing movement of National Surgical, Obstetric, and Anesthesia Plans developed by dozens of countries worldwide and catalyzed by local Ministries of Health and the World Health Organization, cardiac surgery receives little mention because of a lack of individual and societal voices at the table. The cardiothoracic community, however, is ideally positioned to play a pivotal role in securing future access to quality global cardiovascular care.