The older patients get, the higher their risk of death or bleeding after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). But a new study from a Japanese PCI registry suggests a transradial approach can prevent some of those complications, particularly in nonagenarians.

Three-quarters of patients who are diabetic and undergo Roux-en-Y gastric bypass surgery experience remission of the disease within a year of their procedure, Reuters reported of a Danish study March 1.

Delay to hospital presentation and suboptimal post-percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) TIMI flow grades are both independently associated with excess mortality in women who suffer ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), according to a study that sought to better define the disproportionate sex gap in STEMI mortality.

A literature review out of West Virginia University suggests diabetics or those at risk for diabetes and metabolic syndrome could lower that risk by sticking to a largely plant-based diet.

The addition of rivaroxaban to aspirin monotherapy reduces the risk of atherothrombotic events in patients who have experienced an acute coronary syndrome (ACS), but it can also increase those patients’ bleeding risk, according to a study published Feb. 28 in the Journal of the American Heart Association.

An ongoing FDA investigation of generic angiotensin II receptor blocker (ARB) drugs used to treat hypertension and heart failure found higher-than-acceptable levels of the carcinogen N-Nitroso-N-methyl-4-aminobutyric acid (NMBA) in recent batches of losartan potassium tablets, prompting a voluntary recall of 87 lots, the agency announced March 1. NMBA is the third different carcinogenic impurity recently discovered in ARBs.

Overlapping surgery—in which a surgeon moves from one procedure to the next before the first is finished, leaving junior surgeons and trainees to wrap up the noncritical portions of the surgery—isn’t associated with increased mortality or post-op complications in most cases. But, according to a study published in JAMA Feb. 26, it can raise the risk of adverse events in high-risk patients and those undergoing coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery.

A systematic approach to transitioning heart attack patients from the hospital to outpatient care helped the Sanger Heart & Vascular Institute in Charlotte, North Carolina, drop its 30-day readmission and death rates while increasing the likelihood of patients making and keeping follow-up appointments.