The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is alerting healthcare providers, patients and caregivers about serious adverse events associated with left ventricular assist devices (LVADs). These adverse events include an increased rate of pump thrombosis (blood clots inside the pump) with Thoratec’s HeartMate II and a high rate of stroke with the HeartWare HVAD since approval of the devices. The agency is also aware of bleeding complications associated with both devices.

The global market value for bioabsorbable scaffolds (BAS) will expand rapidly from $143.7 million in 2014 to just under $2.1 billion by 2021, said research and consulting firm GlobalData. The surge will be driven primarily by new product approvals and a paradigm shift in the clinical treatment of vascular diseases towards minimally-invasive procedures.

August 5, 2015 — Boehringer Ingelheim announced the first U.S. patients have been enrolled in two of the company's ...

Over the past several years, advanced heart failure patients who have not responded to medical therapy have been given new hope, and are surviving longer with implanted left ventricular assist devices (LVADs). Although echocardiography is recommended for each phase of care for patients with LVADs, there has been limited published data and no formal guidance for the use of echocardiography in this growing patient population. In an effort to fill this gap, a new document, Echocardiography in the Management of Patients with Left Ventricular Assist Devices: Recommendations from the American Society of Echocardiography, will appear in the August 2015 issue of the Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography (JASE).

Jeff Zagoudis, associate editor of the Scranton Gillette Communications’ Healthcare Group publications Imaging ...