Physicians trying to get to the heart—and gut—of the relationship between heart failure and intestinal flora found that higher levels of microbe metabolites in the blood stream appeared to predict mortality risk. Heart failure patients stratified by levels of trimethylamine-N-oxide (TMAO) found in blood samples had progressively more risk for death by year five.

An FDA advisory committee is scheduled to review an application for another novel oral anticoagulant to reduce the risk of stroke or systemic embolism in patients with nonvalvular atrial fibrillation.

Essential Medical, Inc., a privately held medical device company, announced today that it has received CE mark approval for X-Seal, a new vascular closure device with superior handling and closure features. 

Brain hemorrhage survival was highest among patients taken to high-volume stroke care units, according to findings published in the November issue of Neurosurgery. Comprehensive stroke centers and other high-volume stroke care units had the fewest subarachnoid hemorrhage in-hospital deaths, researchers found. 

According to a multinational study, genetically high levels of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) may put patients at increased risk for aortic valve disease. No similar association was found between high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) or triglycerides and the development of aortic valve calcium and stenosis.

The FDA approved St. Jude Medical’s contact-force ablation catheter for treating patients with atrial fibrillation.

The FDA approved the Ever-Flex Self-Expanding Peripheral Stent System for use in the common and external iliac arteries.

Blood pressure may not be the key to improving stroke outcomes after all. In an international study published online Oct. 22 in The Lancet, stroke patients randomized to have blood pressure control within 48 hours of infarct did no better than patients whose high blood pressure remained untreated. They did no worse, either.