Heart Failure News and Research

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Heart failure (HF) is a condition in which a problem with the structure or function of the heart impairs its ability to supply sufficient blood flow to meet the body's needs. It should not be confused with cardiac arrest or myocardial infarction.

Low literacy can shorten life

Not being able to read doesn't just make it harder to navigate each day. Low literacy impairs people's ability to obtain critical information about their health and can dramatically shorten their lives.

24 Jul 2007

Initiative to improve heart failure care at nation's hospitals makes major gains

A national initiative designed to improve heart-failure patient care in hospitals proved effective at increasing hospital adherence to key quality-of-care performance measures and reducing the length of hospital stays for patients.

24 Jul 2007

Being elderly and illiterate means a significantly higher mortality rate

Researchers in the U.S. have found that being elderly and being unable to read and understand basic health information is a bad combination.

24 Jul 2007

Web site puts physicians and hospitals under microscope

As health consumers across the country demand better and more detailed information about their physicians and hospitals, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) is stepping up to detail its own performance efforts ranging from the percentage of clinicians who clean their hands to the number of times physicians take the proper steps in treating heart attack patients.

19 Jul 2007

Wearable cardiac telemedicine system

A Bluetooth heart monitor could text your local hospital if you are about to have a heart attack, according to research published today in Inderscience's International Journal of Electronic Healthcare.

18 Jul 2007

Review of Rosiglitazone for type 2 diabetes mellitus

Little evidence supports using rosiglitazone (Avandia) to improve the quality or length of life among adults with diabetes, according to a systematic review of data by German researchers.

18 Jul 2007

Analysis of diabetes drugs

Most oral medications prescribed for type 2 diabetes are similarly effective for reducing blood glucose, but the drug metformin is less likely to cause weight gain and may be more likely than other treatments to decrease so-called bad cholesterol, according to a report funded by HHS Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

17 Jul 2007

Inverse relationship between mortality rates and performance in the hospital quality alliance measures

A new study from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) shows that patients who go to hospitals ranked higher according to specific quality measures have a lower chance of dying than patients treated at lower-ranked hospitals.

17 Jul 2007

Venous thromboembolism in the U.S.

Venous thrombosis (VTE), the formation of blood clots in a vein, is a major health problem for hospitalized patients in the United States.

16 Jul 2007

Autophagy may accelerate decompensated heart failure

Autophagy, a normal process by which cells eat their own proteins to provide needed resources to the body in times of stress, may paradoxically cause harm to hearts already weakened by disease, researchers from UT Southwestern Medical Center have found.

9 Jul 2007

Exercise reduces inflammation

Although a number of studies have suggested that regular exercise reduces inflammation a condition that is predictive of cardiovascular and other diseases, such as diabetes it is still not clear whether there is a definitive link.

9 Jul 2007

When to move into a nursing home

When is the right time to suggest parents or loved ones can no longer live safely on their own?

4 Jul 2007

Central command system for pulmonary hypertension discovered

Researchers at the University of Alberta have identified a "central command system" for pulmonary hypertension, a disease that currently has no cure and kills thousands each year.

4 Jul 2007

Increase in prescription drug cost sharing associated with lower rates of drug treatment, adherence

A review of previous studies indicates that an increase in prescription drug cost sharing is associated with a decrease in drug spending and use of pharmacies; and for some chronic conditions, higher cost sharing is associated with greater use of expensive medical services, according to an article in the July 4 issue of JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association.

4 Jul 2007

Transplant of angina patients' purified stem cells provides symptom relief

The first U.S. study to transplant a potent form of purified adult stem cells into the heart muscle of patients with severe angina provided evidence that the procedure is safe and produced a reduction in angina pain as well as improved functioning in patients' daily lives, reports the lead researcher at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine.

27 Jun 2007

Women's mortality rates for cardiovascular disease differ widely among hospitals

Women treated for cardiovascular disease at the nation's best- performing hospitals have a 39 percent lower risk-adjusted mortality rate when compared with women at the nation's poorest-performing hospitals, according to the fourth annual HealthGrades Women's Health Outcomes in U.S. Hospitals study.

26 Jun 2007