Barcelona, Spain – Sunday 31 August 2014: Renal denervation seems to be more successful at reducing blood pressure in patients with resistant hypertension when it includes accessory renal arteries, according to research presented at ESC Congress today by Dr Linda Schmiedel from Germany. Dr Schmiedel said: "More than one billion people worldwide suffer from arterial hypertension, which is defined as blood pressure (BP) greater than 140/90 mmHg. Up to 15% of patients suffer from resistant hypertension (rHTN) and are unable to reduce BP below 140/90 mmHg despite adhering ...

Barcelona, Spain – Sunday 31 August 2014: Wine only protects against cardiovascular disease (CVD) in people who exercise, according to results from the In Vino Veritas (IVV) study presented at ESC Congress today by Professor Milos Taborsky from the Czech Republic. Professor Taborsky said: "This is the first randomised trial comparing the effects of red and white wine on markers of atherosclerosis (1) in people at mild to moderate risk of CVD. We found that moderate wine drinking was only protective in people who exercised. Red and white wine produced the same results." Evidence ...

Barcelona, Spain – Sunday 31 August 2014: Drinking tea reduces non-cardiovascular mortality by 24%, reveals a study in 131 000 people presented at ESC Congress today by Professor Nicolas Danchin from France. Professor Danchin said: "If you have to choose between tea or coffee it's probably better to drink tea. Coffee and tea are important components of our way of life. Their effects on cardiovascular (CV) health have been investigated in the past with sometimes divergent results. We investigated the effects of coffee and tea on CV mortality and non-CV mortality in a large ...

Barcelona, Spain – Saturday 30 August 2014: A new method to predict the optimal number and location of automated external defibrillators (AEDs) was presented at ESC Congress today by Dr Benjamin Dahan from France. According to the predictive method, Paris needs 350 AEDs located in public places for optimal prevention of out of hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA). Dr Dahan said: "Out of hospital cardiac arrest is a major public health issue with an annual incidence ranging between 50 and 100 per 100 000 in the general population in Europe and North America. Because the vast ...

Barcelona, Spain – Sunday 31 August 2014: Local anaesthetic is as safe and effective for transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) as general anaesthetic, according to results of the FRANCE 2 registry presented at ESC Congress today by Dr Romain Chopard from France. Dr Chopard said: "Numerous studies have shown that TAVI is a viable treatment alternative for patients with severe symptomatic aortic stenosis who are at very high risk or ineligible for conventional surgical aortic valve replacement. The number of TAVI procedures in France and around the world has increased ...

Barcelona, Spain – Sunday 31 August 2014: A retrievable and repositionable transcatheter aortic valve is effective and safe in a real world setting, according to research presented at ESC Congress 2014 today by Dr Stylianos Pyxaras from Germany. The direct flow medical (DFM) transcatheter aortic valve has unique features that improve operator control and has the potential to improve transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) outcomes in patients with severe aortic stenosis. Dr Pyxaras said: "TAVI is well established as a percutaneous treatment option in patients with ...

Barcelona, Spain – Sunday 31 August 2014: A new batteryless cardiac pacemaker based on an automatic wristwatch and powered by heart motion was presented at ESC Congress 2014 today by Adrian Zurbuchen from Switzerland. The prototype device does not require battery replacement. Mr Zurbuchen, a PhD candidate in the Cardiovascular Engineering Group at ARTORG, University of Bern, Switzerland, said: "Batteries are a limiting factor in today's medical implants. Once they reach a critically low energy level, physicians see themselves forced to replace a correctly functioning ...

Barcelona, Spain – Sunday 31 August 2014: Mortality and morbidity of atrial fibrillation (AF) patients remains high at one year despite good use of oral anticoagulants, according to the one year follow up of the Atrial Fibrillation General Pilot Registry. The findings were presented for the first time at ESC Congress 2014 today by registry chairperson Professor Gregory Lip (Birmingham, UK). Professor Lip said: "This is the first contemporary, ESC sponsored registry focused on management practices of European cardiologists conducted since the ESC guidelines on AF were ...

Administration of colchicine, a plant-based medication commonly used to treat gout, before and after cardiac surgery showed mixed results in reducing potential complications from this type of surgery, but it did increase the risk of gastrointestinal adverse effects, according to a study published by JAMA. The study is being released early online to coincide with its presentation at the European Society of Cardiology Congress. Common complications after cardiac surgery include postpericardiotomy syndrome (the occurrence of the symptoms of pericarditis, including chest ...

Barcelona, Spain – Saturday 30 August 2014: Transvenous lead extraction (TLE) is clinically successful in more than 98% of cases according to data from the European Lead Extraction ConTRolled (ELECTRa) registry presented for the first time today at ESC Congress 2014 by Dr Maria Grazia Bongiorni, chair of the registry's executive committee. Dr Bongiorni said: "The number of cardiac implantable electronic devices (CIED) implant procedures has grown in recent years. Despite advances in technology the number of complications has increased and leads are often the cause. TLE ...

Barcelona, Spain – Saturday 30 August 2014: The first multidisciplinary recommendations on the management of arrhythmias in patients with acute coronary syndromes (ACS) are published today in EP Europace. The position paper was written jointly by the European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA), the Acute Cardiovascular Care Association (ACCA) and the European Association of Percutaneous Cardiovascular Interventions (EAPCI), all of the ESC. Professor Bulent Gorenek (Turkey), chairperson of the task force, said: "Sudden cardiac death is the leading cause of death in Europe, ...

Barcelona, Spain – Saturday 30 August 2014: The first expert consensus on ventricular arrhythmias is published today. The novel document compiles current evidence on the diagnosis and management of ventricular arrhythmias and was agreed by international experts from three continents. The "EHRA/HRS/APHRS Expert Consensus on Ventricular Arrhythmias" is published today on-line in EP Europace (1). It was written jointly by the European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA) of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC), the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) and the Asia Pacific Heart Rhythm ...

Barcelona, Spain – Saturday 30 August 2014: The first comprehensive ESC Guidelines on aortic diseases are published today. They are presented at ESC Congress 2014 by Task Force Chairpersons Professor Raimund Erbel (Germany) and Professor Victor Aboyans (France). The "2014 ESC Guidelines on the diagnosis and treatment of aortic diseases" are published today online in European Heart Journal (1) and on the ESC Website. Professor Erbel said: "Previous ESC recommendations were published in 2001 but they were restricted to the diagnosis and management of aortic dissection. ...

Barcelona, Spain – Saturday 30 August 2014: The first recommendations on the use of all new oral anticoagulants in pulmonary embolism are published today in new ESC Guidelines. The guidelines are launched at ESC Congress by Professor Stavros V. Konstantinides (Germany/Greece) and Professor Adam Torbicki (Poland). The "2014 ESC Guidelines on the diagnosis and management of acute pulmonary embolism" are published today online in European Heart Journal (1) and on the ESC Website. Venous thromboembolism (VTE) includes deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and pulmonary embolism (PE). ...

Barcelona, Spain – Saturday 30 August 2014: A new sudden death predictor for patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) identifies candidates for implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs) in ESC Guidelines published today. They are presented at ESC Congress by Task Force Chairperson Professor Perry Elliott (UK). The "2014 ESC Guidelines on Diagnosis and Management of Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy" are published today on-line in the European Heart Journal (1) and on the ESC Website. Previous ESC Guidelines on hypertrophic cardiomyopathy were published in 2003 (2). Professor ...

Barcelona, Spain – Saturday 30 August 2014: The therapeutic benefit of revascularisation in coronary artery disease (CAD) is emphasised in the 2014 ESC/EACTS revascularisation guidelines presented at ESC Congress by joint Task Force Chairs Professor Stephan Windecker (Switzerland) of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) and Professor Philippe Kolh (Belgium) of the European Association for Cardio-Thoracic Surgery (EACTS). The joint guidelines are published today on-line in European Heart Journal (1), on the ESC Website (2), in EuroIntervention and in the European Journal ...

Researchers at UC Davis have made some surprising discoveries about the body's initial responses to HIV infection. Studying simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV), the team found that specialized cells in the intestine called Paneth cells are early responders to viral invasion and are the source of gut inflammation by producing a cytokine called interleukin-1 beta (IL-1β). Though aimed at the presence of virus, IL-1β causes breakdown of the gut epithelium that provides a barrier to protect the body against pathogens. Importantly, this occurs prior to the wide ...

SAN ANTONIO (Aug. 29, 2014) — Scientists at the Barshop Institute for Longevity and Aging Studies, part of the School of Medicine at the UT Health Science Center at San Antonio, have found another secret of longevity in the tissues of the longest-lived rodent, the naked mole rat. They reported that a factor in the cells of naked mole rats protects and alters the activity of the proteasome, a garbage disposer for damaged and obsolete proteins. The factor also protects proteasome function in human, mouse and yeast cells when challenged with various proteasome poisons, ...

A new report released yesterday by the Mental Health Commission of Canada identifies ways to improve the mental health training and education that police personnel receive. "People with mental illnesses is a prominent issue for Canada's police community, and today's report builds on the increasingly collaborative relationship between law enforcement and people with mental illnesses," says Queen's adjunct professor Dorothy Cotton, a forensic psychologist with an interest in the area of police psychology. "This is a gap-analysis tool that police academy and police services ...

NEW YORK – August 29, 2014 - Despite US Preventive Services Task Force recommendations for screening and treating obesity, there are many barriers, several of which may be ameliorated through technological approaches according to a new study by researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center published online August 21, 2014 in the Journal of General Internal Medicine (JGIM). David Levine, MD, MA, a third year resident in the Department of Internal Medicine at NYU Langone, and colleagues found that compared to usual care, technology-assisted interventions specifically in the ...

After a systematic review of clinical trials based on administering antidepressants for acute and chronic postsurgical pain, researchers have concluded that more trials are needed to determine whether these drugs should be prescribed for postsurgical pain on a regular basis. Dr. Ian Gilron, a professor and director of clinical pain research in the Department of Anesthesiology, and his team of seven researchers reviewed 15 trials to determine whether the use of antidepressants for pain relief post-surgery would work more effectively than painkillers such as opioids, local ...

A leading U.S. Ebola researcher from the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston has gone on record stating that a blend of three monoclonal antibodies can completely protect monkeys against a lethal dose of Ebola virus up to 5 days after infection, at a time when the disease is severe. Thomas Geisbert, professor of microbiology and immunology, has written an editorial for Nature discussing advances in Ebola treatment research. The filoviruses known as Ebola virus and Marburg virus are among the most deadly of pathogens, with fatality rates of up to 90 percent. ...

Dartmouth researchers explored the type and number of connections in transcription factor networks (TFNs) to evaluate the role assortativity plays on robustness in a study published in PLOS Computational Biology in August. The study found that the assortativity signature contributes to a network's resilience against mutations. "In simulations, it seems that varying the out-out assortativity of TFN models has a greater effect on robustness than varying any of the other three types of assortativity," said Dov A. Pechenick, PhD, lead author and former researcher at the ...

Raloxifene is a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved treatment for decreasing fracture risk in osteoporosis. While raloxifene is as effective at reducing fracture risk as other current treatments, this works only partially by suppressing bone loss. With the use of wide- and small-angle x-ray scattering (WAXS and SAXS, respectively), researchers carried out experiments at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) Advanced Photon Source (APS) at Argonne National Laboratory that revealed an additional mechanism underlying raloxifene action, providing an explanation ...

Researchers at the Washington University School of Medicine have identified one way the Ebola virus dodges the body's antiviral defenses, providing important insight that could lead to new therapies, in research results published in the journal Cell Host & Microbe. In work performed at Beamline 19ID at Argonne National Laboratory's Advanced Photon Source, the researchers developed a detailed map of how a non-pathogenic Ebola protein, VP24, binds to a host protein that takes signaling molecules in and out of the cell nucleus. Their map revealed that the viral protein ...