Latest Conference Articles

We need more than ever credible clinical data both on the pandemic, but also how to understand how the pandemic’s going to affect patients in the cardiovascular field, said Richard Kovacs, MD, FACC, clinical cardiologist and president of the American College of Cardiology (ACC).

VOYAGER-PAD helps to underscore that peripheral artery disease is a different disease state than coronary disease and different than stroke. Although they're all unified by an underlying biology of atherosclerosis, the character and the nature of that disease is different, said Marc P. Bonaca, MD, MPH, cardiologist and vascular medicine specialist who serves as the Executive Director of CPC Clinical Research and CPC Community Health.

The trial showed that patients taking this novel therapy, an oral soluble guanylate cyclase stimulator, were 10% less likely to experience the primary outcome—a composite of death from cardiovascular (CV) causes or first hospitalization for HF—than those taking placebo. The drug could address the sickest patients through a mechanism that would take on HF progression.

Results from VICTORIA show vericiguat produced a 10% relative risk reduction in the highest-risk patients with heart failure. Study patients had about 3 times the health risk seen in recent heart failure trials, which showed higher relative risk reductions. However, VICTORIA saw a 4% absolute risk reduction, which is the same as the others, said Javed Butler, MD, MPH, MBA, chairman for the Department of Medicine at the University of Mississippi.

The study, Vascular Outcomes Study of ASA Along with Rivaroxaban in Endovascular or Surgical Limb Revascularization for PAD (VOYAGER-PAD), was designed to fill a knowledge gap: it asked whether a well-known therapy developed to prevent blood clots could be used to prevent events, including acute ischemia in the leg for patients after revascularization.

We have our featured research that we're going to bring—our keynotes, our Young Investigator Awards presentations, and we're going to have some special emphasis on global health, especially relevant in terms of the COVID-19 pandemic, said Richard Kovacs, MD, FACC, clinical cardiologist and president of the American College of Cardiology (ACC).

Research highlighting these trends, based on 10 million death records pulled from a CDC database, will be presented at the American College of Cardiology’s Annual Scientific Session together with World Congress of Cardiology (ACC.20/WCC), which is taking place as a virtual meeting March 28-30.

Giving statins to women before they undergo treatment for breast cancer may help prevent the heart damage caused by some well-known therapies, including trastuzumab.

To optimize use of biologics for asthma, greater attention should be paid to adherence, according to an abstract prepared and published for the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology 2020 Annual Meeting.

The study noted that few oral immunotherapy (OIT) studies include patients with a history of severe reactions requiring epinephrine.

Is it cost-effective to prescribe epinephrine to every patient on allergen immunotherapy (AIT)? Does AIT have an impact on healthcare costs? These and other issues were included among the research prepared and published for the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology 2020 Annual Meeting.

Social determinants found within a person’s environment, mainly where they live and work, have been shown to influence outcomes related to health, functioning, and quality of life, especially where risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) is concerned, according to study results that will be presented during ACC.20/WCC Virtual.

High infusion parameters for pump-assisted and manual push 20% subcutaneous immunoglobulin (SCIg), or IgPro20, were well tolerated by patients with primary immunodeficiency disorder (PID), according to a recent abstract prepared for the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology 2020 Annual Meeting.

Included among the abstracts prepared and published for the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology 2020 Annual Meeting are several that looked at the clinical and psychosocial factors that complicate asthma in pediatric patients. A few are highlighted here.

The first US patients with peanut allergy have been treated with Aimmune Therapeutic’s Palforzia oral immunotherapy (OIT), the company said. The treatment was approved by the FDA in January, and is the first approved treatment for patients with peanut allergy.

The big news at the American College of Cardiology meeting always comes early Saturday right after the opening showcase, and this year March 28 will bring the VICTORIA trial—or, a Vericiguat Global Study in Subjects With Heart Failure With Reduced Ejection Fraction (HFrEF).

The American Journal of Managed Care® discussed the prevalence of poor indoor air quality in childcare facilities with Joshua Steinberg, MD, assistant professor of pediatrics at the Medical College of Wisconsin, and Erin Lee, a clinical research coordinator at the Medical College of Wisconsin.

The American Journal of Managed Care® (AJMC®) dicussed the efficacy of ragweed sublingual immunotherapy (SLIT) tablets with Anne Ellis, MD, professor of medicine and chair of the Division of Allergy & Immunology at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.

The American Journal of Managed Care® (AJMC®) interviewed Elisabet Johansson, PhD, a research fellow at the University of Cincinnati, about how the gene NFE2L2 interacts with secondhand smoke, and increases the risk of asthma.

Researchers tested berberine containing natural medicine (BCNM) in mice with peanut allergy and found the treatment regimen induced long-term tolerance to peanut and a profound, sustained reduction of immunoglobulin E (IgE). In an interview with The American Journal of Managed Care®, Kamal Srivastava, PhD, director of Basic Science Research at General Nutraceutical Technology, explained the growing importance of gut and skin microbiota when it comes to treatment of food allergy.

The American Journal of Managed Care® discussed the real-world burden of reduced quality of life among adolescents with peanut allergies with Anna Nowak-Węgrzyn, MD, PhD, professor of pediatrics at the New York University School of Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, Langone Health, New York.

We think that the ACCC is uniquely positioned to bridge the gap between the needs in clinical trials and the patients who are in the community. Most clinical oncology is delivered in the community. That's where the patients are, that's where the need is, said Randall Oyer, MD, medical director of the Oncology Program at Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health and president of ACCC.

Ensuring that all frontline clinicians are equipped, confident, and engaged in executing skilled communication, which is at the core of palliative care, will make a significant difference for how value-based care unfolds, how payment reform happens, and how the lived experience plays out for patients and families to be a better one, said Rebecca Kirch, JD, executive vice president, Health Care, Quality and Value, National Patient Advocate Foundation.

The theme of ACCC Immediate Past President Ali McBride, PharmD, MS, BPS, BCOP, for his 2019-2020 term was “Collaborate. Educate. Compensate: A Prescription for Sustainable Cancer Care Delivery.” Nowhere was that more evident than in the panel discussion he led on day 2 of this year’s annual conference.

I think a lot of it is, do you trust the people that you're going to be working with? What does it come down to economically? And then I would say on the third end is what can really be done to enhance patient care? As it relates to the decision that you make, said Bradley Prechtl, MBA, chief executive officer of the American Oncology Network.

Can we predict which patients are at high risk of hospitalization? How can we reduce this risk? Debra Patt, MD, MPH, MBA, executive vice president of policy and strategy at Texas Oncology, posed these questions during the ACCC 46th Annual Meeting and Cancer Center Business Summit.

As we move from the mono-therapy era into the combination era, we have to think of new arrangements, perhaps value-based arrangements that will work with the payers and the manufacturers so that patients will have access to these drugs and also have the best ability to get value from them, said Lee Schwartzberg, MD, FACP, chief medical officer and board member at OneOncology.

Healthcare is not political, it’s personal, Senator Debbie Stabenow, D-Michigan, told an audience at the ACCC 46th Annual Meeting and Cancer Center Business Summit, imploring them to come together in a nonpartisan way to improve care access and quality and to reduce costs.