March 24th 2024
For Lp(a) Awareness Day, Mary McGowan, MD, FNLA, chief medical officer of the Family Heart Foundation, highlights how most people with elevated Lp(a) are completely unaware that they have this increased risk and calls for increased testing.
Family History Linked With Early-Onset Atrial Fibrillation in Black and Latino Patients
September 25th 2018Black and Latino individuals are less likely than their white peers to develop early-onset atrial fibrillation (EOAF), yet these individuals experience higher rates of stroke, heart failure, and mortality from AF than do white patients. To date, little has been known about this paradox, as most research into EOAF focuses on white patients.
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MitraClip Reduces Hospital Stays, Deaths Among Patients With Heart Failure
September 24th 2018Heart failure hospitalization has been a target for accountable care organizations seeking to find ways to cut costs from the healthcare system. But it remains to be seen how many of the estimated 2 million patients would gain access to the device if it received an expanded indication and payer coverage.
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US Women Have Higher Risk of Dying Prematurely, Report Says
September 21st 2018In the United States, a woman age 30 to 70 years of age has a 1 in 8 chance of dying from a noncommunicable disease (NCDs), putting the nation on par with low and middle-income countries, and setting it apart with Iceland among high-income countries, according to a report published Thursday in The Lancet.
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ASCEND Results Confirm Aspirin Prevents Primary Vascular Events in Diabetes
August 27th 2018Serious vascular events in patients with diabetes can be prevented with aspirin use, according to results of the ASCEND (A Study of Cardiovascular Events iN Diabetes) trial, which were presented at the ongoing ESC Congress in Munich, Germany.
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GOP senators have introduced legislation they say would protect provisions for preexisting conditions under the Affordable Care Act; Cigna shareholders have voted in favor of the acquisition of pharmacy benefit manager Express Scripts; and study results show that aspirin does not lower cardiovascular (CV) risk in the long-term.
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Patient and Physician Predictors of Hyperlipidemia Screening and Statin Prescription
Physician and patient predictors of hyperlipidemia screening and statin prescription at a large, multihospital regional health center based on electronic health record data.
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Oncology, CVD, Infectious Disease Most Common Areas for Outcomes-Based Contracts, Avalere Finds
July 27th 2018Health plans continue to show interest in expanding outcomes-based contracts, according to an Avalere Health study that also found cardiovascular diseases, infectious diseases, and oncology represent the most common therapeutic areas to have these contracts.
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Direct Oral Anticoagulant Prescription Trends, Switching Patterns, and Adherence in Texas Medicaid
July 12th 2018Direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs) are associated with increased prescription costs. Actual practice data show a high switch rate and poor adherence among DOAC initiators that need to be addressed.
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Under 2017 Guideline, More Than 105 Million Americans Have Hypertension
May 23rd 2018The number of US adults who have high blood pressure could grow by as much as 31 million—and the number of adults who will be recommended for antihypertensive treatment could increase by 11 million—if full implementation of the American Heart Association’s 2017 hypertension guideline is reached.
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Quality of Cardiovascular Care May Vary Substantially Across the VA System
May 16th 2018The authors write that these differences among Veterans Affairs (VA) populations could reflect variability across the medical centers in terms of quality of care, adherence to evidence-based treatment and screening guidelines, access to urgent care, posthospitalization care protocols, chronic disease management, and access to specialty care, social work services, and behavioral health care.
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Women Are Still Underrepresented in Clinical Trials for Cardiovascular Disease Drugs
May 2nd 2018While cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death among women as well as men, and while both sex and gender differences in CVD and its treatments have been well documented, women continue to be less represented than men in clinical trials of drugs to treat CVD. Among proposed reasons for this phenomenon are the recruitment of younger patients, inclusion criteria that tend to select men, and exclusion criteria that are more common in women.
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Research Provides Insight Into Cardiac-Related Mortality in Huntington Disease
May 1st 2018Huntington disease (HD) is an incurable, inherited neurological disorder caused by the mutant Huntingtin gene, which produces a mutant form of Huntingtin protein (mHTT). In addition to creating the profound neurological impacts of HD, the mHTT protein also impairs other organ systems, and new research, published in Cell Reports, suggests that the protein may play a role in cardiac-related mortality in patients with HD.
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JAMA Comparison: SGLT2 Inhibitors, GLP-1 Agonists Offer Lower Mortality in Type 2 Diabetes
April 23rd 2018Guidance for primary care physicians prescribing type 2 diabetes therapies comes at an opportune time. A major rift over guidelines for glycemic control has opened between the American College of Physicians, a professional association of internists, and diabetes specialists, including endocrinologists and diabetes educators.
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