Both men and women with HF faced higher risks for depression and death by suicide in the first 3 months after their diagnosis, researchers reported in JACC: Heart Failure.
“The large burden of disease associated with HF may potentially cause psychosocial distress that worsens suffering, quality of life and long-term health outcomes,” Casey Crump, MD, PhD, vice chair for research in the department of family medicine and community health at Mount Sinai, and colleagues wrote. Read more in Healio.
The risk for heart disease, stroke, disability and mortality among adults with diabetes is higher for those diagnosed at age 50 to 59 years than those diagnosed at age 70 years or older, according to study findings.
In an analysis of data from adults aged 50 years and older participating in the Health and Retirement Study in the U.S., adults who reported they were diagnosed with diabetes at age 50 to 59 years had an increased risk for heart disease, stroke, disability, cognitive impairment and mortality compared with matched controls without diabetes, whereas adults diagnosed at age 70 years or older had a higher risk for only mortality compared with controls. Data did not distinguish between type 1 and type 2 diabetes.
Read the full story in Healio.
NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Four years after a major revision of the U.S. heart transplant allocation rules, deliberations are again underway on how to curb gaming of the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) system.
The recent explosion in Status 2 transplant candidates with advanced heart failure would improbably suggest that “suddenly the entire country has sicker patients,” said Shelley Hall, MD, chief of transplant cardiology at Baylor Scott & White Health in Dallas and chair of the cardiac committee for UNOS. Read more in MedPage Today.
At 26, Melody Hickman of Raleigh, North Carolina, was crestfallen. A routine physical detected a problem with her mitral valve. Fixing it required open-heart surgery.
“I knew I would have to be on a heart-lung machine, and the idea of having the incision really bothered me,” she said, noting she often wore V-neck tops. “It was a lot to digest.”
The surgery and recovery went well. Then, 14 years later, the valve needed to be replaced again. That meant a second open-heart surgery. Read more from American Heart Association News.
On Aug. 11, LifeCenter Northwest, the Organ Procurement Organization for Washington, and UW Medicine’s heart transplant team together facilitated the Pacific Northwest’s first donation-after-circulatory-death (DCD) heart transplant.
The patient, Ryan Stovall, 48, a resident of Beaver Creek, Oregon, is recovering well in Seattle. Read more from News Medical Life Sciences.
What do you say to a family whose gift is keeping you alive?
That’s what Rufus Scott has on his mind. After living with a declining heart for 15 years, the 53-year-old father of three received a new heart on June 12, 2020, during a 12-hour transplant surgery at Emory University Hospital. Read the full story in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Duke Health announced successful completion of the world’s first partial heart transplant, using living arteries and valves from a donor heart that were fused onto the existing heart of a newborn.
The patient, Owen Monroe from Leland, North Carolina, was born with truncus arteriosus — a condition in which the left and right main coronary arteries fused together — as well as atrial regurgitation in one valve. The combination made it unlikely the patient would survive until full heart transplant; therefore, living tissue from the donor heart of another infant, not suitable for full transplant but with strong valves, was used for the novel procedure.
Read the full story in Healio.
While long COVID holds many mysteries, researchers found clues to the heart symptoms common in these patients, which pointed to ongoing inflammation as the mediator.
In a cohort of 346 previously healthy patients with initially mild COVID-19, most seen for lingering symptoms a median of around 4 months later, structural heart disease and elevated biomarkers for cardiac injury or dysfunction were rare. Read the full story in MedPage Today.
Having an organ transplant can feel like a new lease on life!
You find that you can suddenly do more of the things that you enjoy. However, new recipients are sometimes overwhelmed with all the requirements of post-transplant living. Read the full story on CareDx.com.
Anthony Donatelli, age 40, has served in the U.S. Navy for 22 years. On February 14, 2022, he was wheeled into the operating room at UC San Diego Health; his body facing a different kind of combat. His kidney, heart and liver were failing, and he was about to receive three new organs.
“I didn’t have the option of dying. I had two children at home, a six and three-year-old,” said Donatelli. Read the full story from UC San Diego Health.