In Global News: 3D Printing Tracheas, Free Heart Surgery for Children, and a Test for Barrett’s Esophagus

Patient Care
China and Cambodia will work together on a program to provide free heart surgery to 100 Cambodian children with congenital heart disease.
Quadruple bypass surgery was the inspiration a Singapore man needed to turn his lifestyle heart-healthy. Now he has run the Singapore Marathon.
A balloon sampling device that can be swallowed and then retrieved might provide an easier test for Barrett’s esophagus.
 
Drugs and Devices
The US Food and Drug Administration has expanded approval of the lung cancer drug afatinib to patients whose tumors show any of five EGFR mutations.
Brazil marked its first implantations of the transcatheter pulmonary valve called the Venus P-Valve, which is made by Chinese company Venus Medtech, Inc. The valve is under clinical trial investigation in Europe and the US.
 
Research, Trials, and Funding
Researchers in Japan have 3D-printed artificial tracheas without scaffolds using spheroids composed of multiple cell types, which they have transplanted into rats.
Merck announced that its anti-PD-L1 therapy, pembrolizumab met its primary endpoints of longer overall and progression-free survival when given in combination with pemetrexed and chemotherapy for non-small cell lung cancer.