Children’s hospitals across the U.S. are backing a national effort by the Pediatric Congenital Heart Association to improve transparency in the reporting of cardiac surgical outcomes.

An increase in public reporting of aortic valve surgery outcomes has been tied to a decrease in AVR access for patients with infective endocarditis—the unintended consequence of a push for greater transparency in healthcare.

Patients with severe aortic stenosis who undergo TAVR enjoy a minor but significant sustained health benefit that isn’t mirrored in patients who opt for surgical AVR, according to research reported at TCT 2019 in San Francisco.

An economic analysis of COAPT data suggests edge-to-edge TMVR with the MitraClip device is a more affordable long-term treatment option than guideline-directed medical therapy alone for patients with severe secondary MR—but the steep cost of an index TMVR procedure might eclipse that benefit.

Results from the COAPT study continue to roll in, and it was all positive news for the MitraClip team at the TCT conference in San Francisco this month.

Medtronic announced Sept. 27 that it had received FDA approval to launch an early feasibility study for its Intrepid TMVR system using a minimally invasive transfemoral access approach.

The incidence of aborted procedures during transcatheter aortic valve replacement is falling, according to work published in JACC: Cardiovascular Interventions, but centers with low institutional TAVR volume still struggle to keep up with bigger hospitals’ success.

People who currently take or have recently taken fluoroquinolones face higher odds of aortic and mitral regurgitation, according to a report out of Canada.