Hospitals in South Carolina that completed a voluntary, team-based surgical safety checklist had a significantly lower rate of 30-day post-operative mortality compared with hospitals that did not complete the program by the end of 2013, according to a population-based study.

Zia Roshandel, MD, a cardiologist from Virginia, was found not guilty of a misdemeanor assault and battery charge, the Culpeper Star-Exponent reports.

Fewer than half of patients with cardiovascular disease saw a primary care provider and fewer than 40 percent saw a cardiovascular provider during the two years before they had a ST-segment elevation MI (STEMI), according to a prospective cohort study.

In a new clinical trial at PinnacleHealth, based in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, researchers are testing the efficacy of the Keystone Heart TriGuard, a device designed to reduce the risk of stroke during transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) procedures.

Abbott Vascular has restricted the use of its Absorb and Absorb GT1 bioresorbable vascular scaffolds (BVS) in Europe to clinical registries.

New findings on how cardiac muscle cells are damaged during surgery could point to emerging methods that will allow hearts to recover more quickly.

To better treat patients with aortic valve disease, J. Scott Rankin, MD, a surgeon at the West Virginia University Heart and Vascular Institute in Morgantown has developed the HAART 300 Aortic Annuloplasty Device—and it just received approval U.S. Food and Drug Administration this week.

In early 2012, hospitals in New York received reports from the state on their inappropriate PCI rates. The state later published the rates in a medical journal and recommended that payers deny reimbursement for inappropriate PCIs in Medicaid patients.