Le Bonheur Children's Hospital cardiologists in Memphis, Tenn., implanted the Amplatzer Piccolo Occluder, the world's first commercially-approved medical device for transcatheter patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) closure in babies weighing as little as two pounds. The self-expanding, wire mesh device developed by Abbott is inserted through a small incision in the leg and guided through vessels to the heart, where it is placed to seal the opening of the heart.

A study presented at the 2018 annual meeting of the Cardiovascular and Interventional Radiology Society of Europe (CIRSE) explored the safety and efficacy of the JETI-8 Peripheral Thrombectomy System for the treatment of acute deep vein thrombosis (DVT). The study, presented by Jean Cournoyer-Rodrigue, M.D., CHUM Research Center, Montreal, showed 83 percent technical success.

Heart failure experts at the National Research Center for Cardiac Surgery in Astana, Kazakhstan, recently announced the first successful implantation of the FIVAD (Fully Implanted Ventricular Assist Device) into a human. An article about the implantation was also published in the Journal for Heart and Lung Transplantation.

The American College of Cardiology (ACC), along with nine other cardiology professional societies, recently published a new guidance document for appropriate use criteria (AUC) for multimodality imaging in the assessment of cardiac structure and function in nonvalvular heart disease. The guidance was published online Jan. 7 in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC).

Omron Healthcare Inc. and physIQ Inc. announced a collaboration to integrate Omron’s HeartGuide wearable blood pressure monitoring device into the pinpointIQ platform to monitor at-risk patients in an outpatient setting. The strategic collaboration aims to generate actionable clinical information for at-risk patients in an outpatient environment by leveraging the complementary technologies of each company.