Jaffar Khan, MD, explained his team's work using intravascular lithotripsy balloons in a cadaver heart to break up mitral annular calcification. 

"We're constantly trying to keep our fingers on the pulse of what's happening in the real world," explained Joan Michaels, RN, director of the STS/ACC TVT Registry.  "This is not a trial; this is real-world experience."

The minimally invasive operation, known as AVATAR, is performed through a small incision in the patient’s neck.

This year marks the 37th annual gathering of the popular Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics conference. What started as a small gathering in 1988 has grown into one of interventional cardiology’s biggest events.

The company also launched a new clinical trial designed to follow redo TAVR patients who present with symptomatic bioprosthetic valve failure for up to five years.

The Society of Thoracic Surgeons Risk Calculator is more traditionally used to calculate short-term risks, but this single-center analysis suggests it can also anticipate issues well into the future.

The interventional device, designed to perform both M-TEER and T-TEER, is at the center of two new studies published in EuroIntervention.

Though just a small, single-facility study, these findings help care teams know what to look for when performing transcatheter tricuspid valve replacement.