In Global News: Transcatheter Heart Valves, Lung Function, and the Human Sinoatrial Node [1]
Patient Care
An Iraqi boy from Mosul went from Jordan to Australia for surgery to correct the blood flow through his heart [3] and repair a hole between his ventricles.
Transcatheter approaches continue growing as transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) is performed for the first time in Kenya [4] at the Aga Khan University Hospital and in Bangladesh [5] at the United Hospital Ltd.
The Palestinian Authority chief negotiator will need a lung transplant [6] as medical treatment for his pulmonary fibrosis is no longer sufficient.
A professional basketball player in the USA talks about undergoing and recovering from open heart surgery [7].
Drugs and Devices
Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, is partnering with AliveCor to improve early detection of long QT syndrome [8] with AliveCor’s Kardia Mobile device.
The European Medicines Agency must relocate from its current London offices ahead of Brexit (the UK leaving the European Union), and 19 different cities [9] are vying to be the agency’s new home [10].
The Avalus pericardial aortic surgical valve from Medtronic, an MRI-safe stented valve, is now CE (Conformité Européenne) marked and has received US Food and Drug Administration approval [11]. Medtronic also announced CE mark and the European launch of the CoreValveTM EvolutTM PRO valve [12].
Research, Trials, and Funding
Researchers at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, find that the human heart has multiple pacing mechanisms [13] with redundancies in the sinoatrial node.
Researchers at the CSIR Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology in New Delhi, India, will soon start a longitudinal study of the factors affecting lung function in children [14].