Patients who stopped taking aspirin one month after receiving a stent in the heart’s arteries but continued taking the P2Y12 inhibitor clopidogrel fared significantly better after one year compared with those who followed the standard practice of continuing both medications, according to recent research. Stopping aspirin early was found to be superior in terms of the trial’s primary endpoint, a composite of death from cardiovascular causes, heart attack, clotting near the stent, stroke and major bleeding. The data were presented at the American College of Cardiology’s (ACC) 68th Annual Scientific Session, March 16-18 in New Orleans.

Phase 3 results from Study 2, also known as CLEAR WISDOM, of bempedoic acid were recently presented at the American College of Cardiology (ACC) Scientific Sessions & Expo, March 16-18 in New Orleans. Bempedoic acid is being developed as a complementary, cost-effective, convenient, once-daily, oral therapy for the treatment of patients with elevated low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C). Bempedoic acid and the bempedoic acid/ezetimibe combination tablet new drug applications have been submitted to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and are under regulatory review for marketing authorization by the European Medicines Agency.

Clinicians should use echocardiography when determining whether patients with heart failure and a leaking heart valve are likely to benefit from valve repair, according to research presented at the American College of Cardiology’s 68th Annual Scientific Session, March 16-18 in New Orleans.

Results from the landmark Worldwide Randomized Antibiotic Envelope Infection Prevention Trial (WRAP-IT) demonstrated Medtronic’s Tyrx Absorbable Antibacterial Envelope reduced the risk of major infection by 40 percent, and pocket infection by 61 percent, in patients with cardiac implantable electronic devices (CIEDs). The improvements were in comparison to standard-of-care pre-operative antibiotics. The trial results were presented in a late-breaking session at the American College of Cardiology’s 68th Annual Scientific Sessions (ACC.19), March 16-18 in New Orleans, and published simultaneously in The New England Journal of Medicine.