Cardiology News and Research

Latest Cardiology News and Research

Optical coherence tomography (OCT) can successfully identify the characteristics of coronary plaques

A catheter-based imaging technology called optical coherence tomography (OCT) can successfully identify the characteristics of coronary plaques in patients with various cardiac symptoms. The report from researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) will appear in the journal Circulation.

29 Mar 2005

Role of uric acid in heart disease

In this month's premier open access medical journal PLoS Medicine, John Danesh and colleagues from the University of Cambridge, along with investigators from the Icelandic Heart Association, report the single largest prospective study addressing the role of uric acid in heart disease.

29 Mar 2005

Herceptin - more powerful treatment for patients with HER-2-positive breast cancer

A new use of the drug Herceptin appears to offer a much more powerful treatment advantage than expected for patients with HER-2-positive breast cancer, say researchers at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center.

29 Mar 2005

Pcsk9 gene - new target for cholesterol-lowering drugs

Mice lacking a key protein involved in cholesterol regulation have low-density lipoprotein, or "bad" cholesterol, levels more than 50 percent lower than normal mice, and researchers suggest that inhibiting the same protein in humans could lead to new cholesterol-lowering drugs.

29 Mar 2005

Vaccine prevents deadly pneumonia in African children

Global health leaders today presented new research showing that vaccinating infants against Streptococcus pneumoniae -- a bacterium that causes deadly pneumonia, meningitis and sepsis -- could substantially reduce death and serious illness among children in the developing world. If used widely, a pneumococcal conjugate vaccine could prevent hundreds of thousands of child deaths each year.

28 Mar 2005

Body fat may promote inflammation

Why does extra fat around the waist increase the risk of heart disease? A new study by Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center researchers and colleagues suggests that inflammation may be the key.

28 Mar 2005

Vegetarians who don't cook their food have abnormally low bone mass

Vegetarians who don't cook their food have abnormally low bone mass, usually a sign of osteoporosis and increased fracture risk. But a research team at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis also found that raw food vegetarians have other biological markers indicating their bones, although light in weight, may be healthy.

28 Mar 2005

Statins appear to be safe for people with fatty liver disease

Statins appear to be safe for people with fatty liver disease who could benefit from their cholesterol-lowering capabilities, concludes a review paper published in the April 2005 issue of Hepatology, the official journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD).

28 Mar 2005

Gene/yeast finding links processes in heart disease and cancer

By studying a little-known yeast too primitive to get diseases, Johns Hopkins researchers have uncovered a surprising link between two processes at play in heart disease and cancer in people.

28 Mar 2005

Genome in gut bacterium key to intestinal health

A bacterium that lives in the human gut adaptively shifts more than a quarter of its genes into high gear when its host's diet changes from sugar to complex carbohydrates.

28 Mar 2005

Hope of new treatments for liver damage

There is currently no cure for liver cirrhosis and a patient's only hope of survival is to receive a liver transplant.

28 Mar 2005

Fish is brain food

Researchers with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) found that a diet high in docosahexenoic acid, or DHA--an omega-3 fatty acid found in relatively high concentrations in cold-water fish--dramatically slowed the progression of Alzheimer's disease in mice.

28 Mar 2005

Acupuncture treatments using low levels of electrical stimulation can lower blood pressure

Acupuncture treatments using low levels of electrical stimulation can lower elevations in blood pressure by as much as 50 percent, researchers at the Susan Samueli Center for Integrative Medicine at UC Irvine have found.

28 Mar 2005

US Court rejects appeal of Terri Schiavo's parents

The full 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta has denied the request by Terri Schiavo's parents that doctors be ordered to reinsert the feeding tube that has kept their brain-damaged daughter alive for 15 years.

23 Mar 2005

Heart attacks can be triggered by physical exertion and emotional stress

Philip Strike and Andrew Steptoe of University College London, in a review published in the current issue of Psychosomatic Medicine, of dozens of studies done between 1970 and 2004 have come up with compelling evidence that indicates that people with a history of heart disease, can trigger heart attacks, some of them fatal, by physical exertion and emotional stress.

23 Mar 2005

First patient to test new treatment for peripheral arterial disease

For several years, crippling leg pain has prevented Joan Erickson from walking more than a block. If she paused to rest, she could walk a little more, but not enough to continue playing golf, her favorite pastime.

23 Mar 2005

Docosahexaenoic acid may protect against the accumulation of a protein believed to be linked to Alzheimer's disease

Docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), an omega-3 fatty acid, may protect against the accumulation of a protein believed to be linked to Alzheimer's disease, according to the results of a new study published in the March 30, 2005 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience. The study used Martek DHA, which is produced from microalgae.

23 Mar 2005

New form of technology to treat cardiac arrhythmias

Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center physicians are among the first in the country to use a new form of technology to treat distant, malfunctioning areas inside the heart that cause irregular heartbeats, or cardiac arrhythmias.

23 Mar 2005

Treatment of cardiac lesions without anaesthesic

Navarre University Hospital has introduced a novel technique for the treatment of congenital heart defects and involving the percutaneous closure of the patent foramen ovale (PFO) with monitoring through intracavernous ecography.

23 Mar 2005

How does the body keep the number of neutrophils produced constant in the blood?

Every day, the human body manufactures and destroys about 100 billion neutrophils- the most common type of white blood cell and one of the most highly-produced cells. Neutrophils live about eight hours, are bacteria-eaters and are a key component of the immune system. Without them, the body can be subject to life-threatening infection.

23 Mar 2005