French company Robocath announced Sept. 24 it had successfully completed its first two in-human coronary angioplasties performed with assistance from its R-One robotic platform.

Five-year results of the ABSORB III trial suggest that, while target lesion failure and scaffold thrombosis have remained apparent in patients implanted with bioresorbable vascular scaffolds, the poor outcomes associated with BVS seemed to subside after three years, when the stents had completely dissolved.

Annual hospital PCI-related mortality rates might be unreliable measures of a center’s performance, according to work published in JAMA Cardiology, proving unhelpful for identifying high-quality care in a study of 67 New York hospitals.

The need for surgical bailout in heart patients undergoing TAVR is low, according to research published in JACC: Cardiovascular Interventions, but when it is performed outcomes are poor, reaching 50% mortality at 30 days.

With minimally invasive structural procedures crowding out their surgical counterparts, how are physicians and hospitals preparing for the new reality? 

Three-year results from the BIO-RESORT trial revealed that despite significant differences in stent backbone and polymer coating, the ultrathin sirolimus-eluting stent, very-thin everolimus-eluting stent and thin-strut zotarolimus-eluting stent remained equally safe and effective through follow-up.

Complete revascularization is superior to culprit-lesion-only PCI in patients with both STEMI and multivessel disease, according to results from the COMPLETE trial, published Sept. 1 in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Using donor hearts from patients who died of traumatic brain injury might be a more viable option for transplant candidates than previously thought, according to an analysis published in the Journal of the American Heart Association Aug. 30.