The safety of an artificial heart valve

When patients need a new heart valve, they can get an artificial one—if they’re healthy enough for the conventional method, open-heart surgery. But a new artificial valve, inserted via catheter, doesn’t require major surgery at all, and a group of heart experts is meeting Wednesday to weigh in on the device’s safety. The artificial Sapien heart valve system, from Edwards Lifesciences, will be reviewed by an advisory panel to the FDA, which doesn’t have to follow the panel’s advice but usually does. Replacement valves are needed when the aorta, the main artery that carries blood away from the heart, becomes narrowed and prevents blood from flowing normally. The Sapien valve can be threaded through a leg artery to the aorta. In a clinical trial among patients deemed too sick for surgery, those who had the Sapien valve had better survival after a year than those who got other care, including using a balloon catheter to repair the valve.

Heart screening

Heart screening tests to be offered to millions of adults across England could be a waste of resources, a study warns.

Everyone between 40 to 74 is to be invited for screening for the early signs of heart disease and other problems by their GP. However, Cambridge University researchers say targeting only "higher-risk" people would save just as many lives, and potentially cost less. Their research was published in the British Medical Journal.

The researchers said universal screening, while effective, might be "unrealistic to implement" at a time when the NHS was likely to be increasingly short of resources. "Policy makers have to decide on the balance between the number of people needed to screen or treat and the number of cases that can be prevented in the population," they said. "Given that universal screening will take years to implement, it makes sense to prioritise people who are most likely to benefit," he added. "There are untreated patients at high risk of cardiovascular disease, most of whom can be identified from their electronic primary care records. We should act on this information."

Go red for your heart

The Mobile County Health Department is encouraging women to take part in Wear Red Day on Friday, Feb. 5. By wearing something red, such as a red dress, a red shirt, or red lipstick, women can show support of Go Red for Women, the American Heart Association’s program to build awareness of heart disease and other cardiovascular diseases among women.

According to Dr. Bert Eichold, Health Officer, only 1 in 5 women believes that heart disease is the greatest threat to her health. In fact, he says, it is the No. 1 killer of women over the age 20.

Portugueses são dos que mais morrem por AVC

Fonte: aqui.

Portugal é o segundo país com mais mortes devido a acidentes vasculares cerebrais, apenas superado pela Hungria, entre 27 Estados analisados num estudo Organização para a Cooperação e Desenvolvimento Económico (OCDE).

A mortalidade por acidente vascular cerebral (AVC) é em Portugal de 125,9 homens e de 99,6 mulheres por cada 100.000 pessoas.