A federal judge ruled that five product liability claims against St. Jude Medical over its Riata defibrillator leads can move forward.

More than half of a group of infants and children who underwent heart transplantation at a California hospital starting in 1985 survived at least 15 years after surgery, according to research presented at the annual meeting of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons in Orlando, Fla.

Temple University Hospital (TUH) could be among the first U.S.-based hospitals to test a new device known as a multilayer stent in patients suffering from aortic aneurysm, a condition characterized by the formation of a potentially life-threatening bulge in the aorta. Approved in Europe in 2010, the device has already been used to help hundreds of European patients with the condition, and Grayson H. Wheatley III, MD, FACS, Associate Professor of Surgery at Temple University School of Medicine, and Director of Aortic & Endovascular Surgery at TUH, thinks thousands more could benefit in the United States.

Edwards Lifesciences Corporation, the global leader in the science of heart valves and hemodynamic monitoring, today announced that it has received CE Mark in Europe and is initiating the launch of its most advanced transcatheter aortic valve, the Edwards SAPIEN 3 valve.

Readmission after PCI is common, and a study published online online Jan. 14 in Circulation: Cardiovascular Interventions found that PCI readmissions were most often due to recurrent chest pain or angina symptoms that were typically not caused by a heart attack. Instead, the symptoms were often related to diagnostic studies or procedures.

About half of patients with paroxysmal atrial fibrillation (AF) who underwent cryoballoon-based pulmonary vein ablation in the STOP AF trial experienced early recurrences of AF. Within that early recurrence subset, those who chose repeat ablation were more likely to be AF-free at one year.

The Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) recommended that serelaxin not be approved as a treatment to relieve symptoms in patients with acute heart failure. The European committee’s decision could influence an FDA panel that will review the drug’s application in February.

Self-measured blood pressure readings may be better predictors of cardiovascular issues or death than conventional blood pressure measurements, except among people with severe hypertension, according to a study published in the January issue of PLOS Medicine.