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Journal and News Scan
September 12, 2020
Submitted by: Jessica Luc
In this article, the authors demonstrate a novel technique of antegrade cardioplegia decannulation using the Cor-Knot system with phenomenal video and description on their case series. This technique has great utility in cases where closing the cardioplegia cannulation site can be challenging in minimally invasive video-assisted cardiac surgery.
September 11, 2020
Submitted by: Emily Robinson
Del Forno et al. present a retrospective study of 77 patients with de-novo 50-70% coronary stenosis undergoing valvular surgery. In these patients, bypass grafting of these coronaries was intentionally omitted. Within their cohort they did not observe any perioperative mortality and there was only one acute coronary syndrome leading to PCI and the overall PCI rate at six years was only 8 +/- 3.9%. Therefore, it seems to be safe to not bypass such stenosis and leave it to later follow-up and ischemia diagnostics.
September 7, 2020
Submitted by: Aristotle Protopapas
Patients with aneurysms 7 cm or greater demonstrated a higher probability of survival when treated immediately, compared to delayed repair, for patients under 80 years of age.
An interesting attempt to construct a decision tool for aortic aneurysms.
September 3, 2020
Submitted by: Emily Robinson
This original article retrospectively analyzes the outcome of 359 patients after TEVAR at seven centers. All patients were stratified regarding the modified arch landing nomenclatur (MALAN). The rate of proximal endograft failure was significantly lower in patients with favorable landing area (MALAN 2/III and 3/III). Regarding these results, the MALAN classification can be used to guide decisions in pre-TEVAR planning.
September 1, 2020
Submitted by: Wei-Guo Ma
This is a comprehensive review on iatrogenic aortic dissection occurring intraoperatively,and within one month after cardiac surgery, covering the incidence, discovery, pathology, detection modalities, management, risk factors, and prevention of this rare but life-threatening complication.
August 20, 2020
Submitted by: Jessica Luc
In this article, Dr. Bethencourt outlines eight key strategies for successful robotic heart startups and how to initiate a new robotic program at one's institution.
August 20, 2020
Submitted by: Jessica Luc
This succinct article reviews the contemporary literature regarding sex differences in thoracic aortic disease including the epidemiology, biology, natural history, surgical management and outcomes. Furthermore, the authors propose explanations for the observed differences and puts out a call to action to close the gender gap in sex differences in thoracic aortic disease.
August 20, 2020
Submitted by: Jessica Luc
The present study reports on the multicenter cohort of patients from the Sutureless and Rapid-Deployment Aortic Valve Replacement International Registry who underwent minimally invasive reoperative aortic valve replacement with a sutureless or rapid-deployment prosthesis. This study demonstrates the safety and feasiblitity of minimally invasive reoperative aortic valve replacement with a sutureless or rapid-deployment prosthesis.
August 20, 2020
Submitted by: Jessica Luc
The present article is a digital health primer for cardiothoracic surgeons that reviews the role of data integration, processing, modelling, monitoring, and more on the future of cardiothoracic surgery.
August 19, 2020
Submitted by: Saurabh Gupta
The authors created 612 matched pairs of patients with a history of hematologic malignancy and controls. They compared operative details, early postoperative complications, and late survival.
Patients with prior diagnosis of malignancy had lower hemoglobin levels and were at greater risk of receiving postoperative blood transfusions (47.4% vs. 35.6%, P<0.0001).
Reoperations for postoperative bleeding (4.7% vs. 3.3%, P=0.253) and stroke (1.3% vs. 1.3%, P>0.999) were similar. Thirty-day mortality in patients with hematologic malignancy was 3.3%, and 1.5% in matched controls (P=0.061).
Overall survival among patients with cancer was reduced (P<.0001).
The authors concluded that while late survival is reduced in patients with hematologic malignancies, early outcomes are generally similar to matched controls. As such, these patients should be offered surgery.