Survival rates for patients treated with Abiomed’s Impella RP right ventricular assist device have been much lower in a postapproval study than they were during the device’s premarket clinical trials, the FDA said Feb. 4 in a letter to physicians.  

Researchers from the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College have developed a dime-sized innovation they claim converts the heart’s energy into electricity to power implantable devices like pacemakers and defibrillators, potentially saving cardiovascular patients the time, money and stress of repeat surgery.

E-cigarette users can now add stroke to the list of risks they incur when they make the choice to vape, according to a study of more than 400,000 Americans.

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is rare during dobutamine stress echocardiography (DSE), a routine exam for assessing coronary ischemia, but elderly patients and those with a history of paroxysmal AF are at an increased risk for arrhythmia during the test, a team of researchers from Boulogne, France, reported.

A Journal of the American Heart Association study focused on the programming safety of cardiac implantable electronic devices (CIEDs) suggests the publication of clinically meaningful trial results and professional recommendations translates poorly into real-world practice, penetrating just a fraction of a field that might benefit from added guidance.

Stryker announced on Feb. 1 it is voluntarily recalling certain Lifepak 15 monitor/defibrillators over an issue which may cause the devices to lock up and not deliver potentially life-saving therapy. The company reported there have been six patient deaths after delays in therapy related to this problem.

Statin therapy reduces the risk of major cardiovascular events across all age ranges, even among people older than 75, according to a meta-analysis published in The Lancet.

Rates of CVD in the U.S. are climbing for the first time in decades, the American Heart Association announced Jan. 31 in its annual heart and stroke statistical update. The organization also said nearly half of the adult U.S. population has some form of heart disease.