Boehringer Ingelheim today announces that Pradaxa (dabigatran etexilate) has been approved by the European Commission for the treatment and prevention of recurrence of deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and pulmonary embolism (PE). The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Pradaxa for DVT and PE patients earlier this year. DVT and PE can be very dangerous; almost one in three PE patients dies within three months and four out of 10 patients suffer a repeat blood clot within 10 years of the first.

Elderly patients in ROCKET AF saw equal benefits with less risk of intracranial bleeding with rivaroxaban compared with warfarin. But there was a greater risk of noncranial bleeding in these patients.

Cook Medical launched its Zilver PTX Drug-Eluting Peripheral Stent in Canada at the Canadian Interventional Radiology Association (CIRA) meeting in Montreal, Canada. It’s the first drug-coated stent in Canada indicated to treat peripheral arterial disease (PAD) in the superficial femoral artery (SFA).

A presentation by principal investigator Eric J. Dippel, MD, of Genesis Heart Institute in Davenport, Iowa, at the annual New Cardiovascular Horizons (NCVH) conference in New Orleans last week demonstrated significant procedural advantage of laser atherectomy in the largest randomized trial of atherectomy ever conducted.

Medtronic, Inc. (NYSE: MDT), today announced CE (Conformité Européenne) Mark and commercial launch of the Advisa and Ensura SR MRI(tm) SureScan single chamber pacemaker devices in Europe. Both pacemakers are approved for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans positioned on any region of the body. These devices are not approved in the United States.

About two in three hospitals certified by Medicare to provide carotid artery stenting (CAS) procedures had higher than average risks for mortality over a two-year period. These findings, published online June 3 in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, outline a way to review hospitals to determine which require more scrutiny prior to recertification.

Heart failure patients with left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) between 30 and 35 percent do better with an implantable cardioverter-defibrilators (ICD) than without, a study published June 4 in JAMA confirmed. The findings also support guideline recommendations for use of ICDs in patients with LVEF of less than 30.

Patients who underwent off-pump CABG surgery were less likely than on-pump patients to experience postoperative acute kidney injury, based on an analysis of CORONARY data published in the June 4 issue of JAMA. But kidney function remained similar between the groups at one year.