A press conference at the 2018 Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics meeting in San Diego on Tuesday, Sept. 25, morphed into a discussion about the future of bioresorbable vascular scaffolds (BVS) and whether it’s worth pursuing bioresorbable stent technology at all.

Acute coronary syndrome patients who were given a loading dose of atorvastatin before percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) experienced a 28 percent reduction in major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) over the following 30 days, according to a secondary analysis of the randomized SECURE-PCI trial published in JAMA Cardiology.

Intravascular ultrasound (IVUS)-guided stent implantation offers improved clinical outcomes for heart patients over a traditional angiography-guided approach, researchers from China reported at this week’s Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics (TCT) meeting in San Diego, California.

A novel, polymer-free amphilius-eluting stent known as the “Cre8” was proven noninferior to the latest-generation permanent polymer drug-eluting stent in the first large-scale trial of its kind, according to research presented at the Cardiovascular Research Foundation’s 30th annual TCT conference in San Diego.

SAN DIEGO — The ultra-thin Orsiro drug-eluting stent (DES) maintained superior outcomes at two years of follow-up in a head-to-head trial against Abbott’s Xience stent, according to results presented this weekend at Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics 2018 and published online in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

The proportion of percutaneous coronary interventions (PCIs) performed in nonagenarians has more than doubled in the last decade in the United States, offering a significant survival benefit for those deemed healthy enough for the procedure, according to a study published online Sept. 17 in JACC: Cardiovascular Interventions.

Off-pump coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) is associated with an 11 percent increased risk of mortality compared to on-pump CABG, according to a registry study of cardiac surgeries performed in New Jersey from 2005 to 2011.

Women who received percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) in the U.S. from 2004 through 2014 were 20 percent more likely to die in the hospital and 81 percent more likely to experience major bleeding compared to men, according to an analysis published this month in PLOS One. Those differences remained after adjusting for preprocedural risk factors.