In Global News: A Patient With Two Hearts, ECMO for Trauma, and Stroke Risk in AFib

Patient Care
A woman in the northwest US who was thought to have drowned makes a surprising recovery, aided by a local hospital’s use of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation for traumatic heart and lung injuries.
An Indian man now has two hearts, as his surgical team performed a heterotopic heart transplant upon realizing that the donor heart could be too small for the patient.
 
Drugs and Devices
The SherpaPak™ and SherpaPerfusion™ Cardiac Transport Systems, heart and kidney transportation devices from Paragonix Technologies, have received the CE mark.
The US Food and Drug Administration has approved tezacaftor/ivacaftor and ivacaftor from Vertex Pharmaceuticals to treat cystic fibrosis in patients with particular CFTR mutations.
 
Research, Trials, and Funding
Researchers in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, found that over 20% of children who underwent cardiac surgery as infants had hearing loss, a rate 20 times higher than in the general population.
Research from the Penn Atrial Fibrillation Free Study, based at the University of Pennsylvania, suggests that despite having a lower risk of developing atrial fibrillation, African Americans with atrial fibrillation have a higher risk of stroke when compared to Caucasian Americans.