Human stem cells helped restore left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) in monkeys induced with experimental heart failure, giving scientists hope a similar treatment could work in humans following myocardial infarction.

The thinking behind the Seattle Proportional Risk Model goes like this: As the annual risk for all-cause mortality increases, the likelihood that the death will be sudden—or something an ICD could prevent—goes down.

Just a week after Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center in Houston reopened its heart transplant program, CMS sent a letter to the hospital saying it will cut off funding for the program beginning Aug. 17.

Continuing cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) appeared to offer no benefit to patients who received a continuous flow left ventricular assist device (CF-LVAD), according to a multicenter study published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.

Heart failure patients treated at hospitals with lower 30-day mortality rates also enjoy a survival benefit one, three and even five years later, suggesting a short-term risk-standardized mortality rate (RSMR) may deserve additional weight in CMS’s financial incentive programs.

Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center in Houston reopened its heart transplant program June 15 after a two-week suspension in which the hospital conducted an internal review of two recent patient deaths.

Scientists are researching how to take stem cells from the patient’s blood to repair damage to the heart. A new therapy could reduce the need for operations, the U.K.’s Express newspaper reports, with researchers hoping the therapy could save lives while being cost effective. 

Patients who progressed to having longer episodes of subclinical atrial fibrillation (SCAF) were more than four times as likely to be hospitalized for heart failure in a one-year span, according to a study published June 4 in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.