It turns out social media isn’t only a way to waste time. According to the American Heart Association (AHA), social media and the use of mobile devices have the combined potential to speed up access to cardiovascular care and ultimately save lives.

Willow Short, a 2-year-old who underwent a heart transplant when she was a few weeks old, was found dead in her Pennsylvania home in an apparent murder-suicide, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. Her parents, Mark and Megan, and two siblings also died.

Researchers from aPennsylvania State University and Texas Tech University received $299,954 in funding from the National Science Foundation to conduct a study examining the best practices for treating patients following cardiac surgery.

With practice, physicians often become better at their jobs. It’s not too surprising. Studies have found veteran surgeons typically have better outcomes than their less experienced colleagues. The trend applies for most procedures.

After the state of New York instituted a policy in 2006 that excluded patients with cardiogenic shock from publicly disclosed risk-adjusted mortality rates, the rates of PCI for patients with acute MI and cardiogenic shock increased significantly, according to a database analysis.

Increasing treatment with Omega-3 fatty acids facilitates increased healing in patients who have had a heart attack, according to the results of a new study published in the journal Circulation. 

Will new rules proposed for donor heart allocation provide a lifeline for the sickest patients or add complexity and cost to a system that struggles to achieve fairness and efficiency?

Could precision medicine reshape how cardiologists evaluate and treat chest pain, potentially reducing costs and increasing patient safety?