ECRI Institute recently reviewed published data on Abiomed's Impella RP (Right Percutaneous) transcatheter ventricular assist device (VAD). The institute said the device provides immediate significant improvements in hemodynamics with considerable short-term and long-term survival rates.

Biotronik announced the publication of promising clinical results regarding its Pulsar-18 stent platform. Adding to the similarly encouraging data collected in the earlier 4EVER and PEACE trials, the new results — published in Clinical Medical Insights: Cardiology — further confirm the safety and efficacy of the Pulsar-18 self-expanding nitinol stent, with positive patency results for very challenging cases of femoropopliteal disease.

Professional physician associations consider certain routine tests before elective surgery to be of low value and high cost, and have sought to discourage their utilization. Nonetheless, a new national study by researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center finds that despite these peer-reviewed recommendations, no significant changes have occurred over a 14-year period in the rates of several kinds of these pre-operative tests.

Start-up company GraftWorx was chosen as "Best in Show" at the Mid-Atlantic Bio Angels (MABA) 1st Pitch Life Science event, an investors' conference held in New York in June. Graftworx is a medical device company that has developed a unique peripheral vascular prosthetic bypass graft incorporating a sensor that can alert physicians when blood flow in the graft is blocked due to restenosis.