Herzspezialisten

10/04/2026

🔴The 10 Commandments of PFO Pathophysiology & Patient Selection

https://www.jacc.org/doi/10.1016/j.jcin.2026.01.296

06/04/2026

AbstractExercise training improves cardiovascular health and reduces the risk for future cardiovascular events and mortality. However, emerging evidence suggests that Masters athletes may have a hi...

03/04/2026

Herz-Kreislauf-Erkrankungen zeigen sich bei Frauen oft anders. Warum Symptome häufig übersehen werden und welche Warnzeichen ernst zu nehmen sind - die Initiative Go Red klärt auf.

30/03/2026

Dig-RHD: Digoxin lowered the risk of death or new-onset or worsening compared with placebo in patients with rheumatic heart disease (RHD).

See the full results ➡️ https://bit.ly/4lYK9Al

30/03/2026

SCOUT-HCM: Mavacamten, a first-in-class drug, was associated with a significant improvement in LVOT gradient compared to placebo in adolescent patients with obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.

Read the full results ➡️ https://bit.ly/3Q7Vbas

01/03/2026

Among patients with anterior myocardial infarction, adding low-dose rivaroxaban to dual antiplatelet therapy did not significantly reduce left ventricular thrombus formation at 1 month but increased minor bleeding.

https://ja.ma/4u1CGUC

27/02/2026

Lipoprotein(a)-lowering therapies: a promising future. A state-of-the-Art review in
👉 ow.ly/V6Rm50YlK3J

25/02/2026

Smartwatches can diagnose asymptomatic atrial fibrillation (AF) noninvasively; a new study compared smartwatch screening with routine care.

"If you look for AF, you’ll find it. But the clinical usefulness of detecting short, asymptomatic episodes of AF is unclear," writes Associate Editor Mark S. Link, MD.

17/02/2026

🫀⚖️ High-risk coronary plaques: intervene early—or hold the line?

This 2026 EuroIntervention Viewpoint by Mintz & Collet delivers a sober, evidence-driven answer to one of interventional cardiology’s most debated questions: should we prophylactically stent “high-risk” plaques, or manage them medically and wait?

🔍 What defines a high-risk plaque?
Across invasive and non-invasive imaging, features such as large plaque burden, small MLA, thin-cap fibroatheroma, large lipid core, low-attenuation plaque, positive remodelling, napkin-ring sign, and spotty calcification consistently associate with future events. Lesions with multiple features are riskier—but here’s the catch 👇

📉 Absolute risk is low
Despite ominous imaging, annual hard event rates (death/MI) are ~1%, and most plaque ruptures are clinically silent, contributing to progression rather than ACS. This reframes the entire preventive-PCI debate.

🧪 What do randomized trials show?
PROSPECT ABSORB and PREVENT tested preventive PCI vs optimal medical therapy (OMT).
PCI improved lumen dimensions and reduced future revascularizations, but did not reduce death or MI at 2, 4, or 7 years.
In PREVENT, 739 PCIs prevented only 20–36 later PCIs—a poor trade-off.
Meta-analysis confirms: benefits are driven by fewer procedures, not fewer hard events.

⏳ What happens if we wait?
Long-term follow-up (PROSPECT II, PREVENT) shows very low event rates with OMT and delayed PCI when symptoms arise, avoiding most upfront interventions without penalty.

🧠 Where the field is heading
The authors advocate a “hold-the-line” strategy:
Detecting high-risk plaque should trigger intensified medical therapy and surveillance, not automatic PCI.
Future precision may come from integrating imaging + physiology + inflammation, to identify the rare plaques whose rupture truly matters.

🔮 Bottom line
Until we can predict **which plaques will cause death or MI—not just progression—**the data favor medical therapy first, PCI later if needed.
Seeing risk ≠ fixing it with a stent 🚀

12/02/2026

25/01/2026

In patients with atrial fibrillation after successful ablation, rivaroxaban therapy did not lead to a significantly lower incidence of a composite of stroke, systemic embolism, or new covert embolic stroke than aspirin therapy. Full OCEAN trial results and Research Summary: nej.md/3LsRJ86

25/01/2026

💬 Editorial: Stroke risk classification that relies solely on carotid stenosis severity overlooks patients with nonobstructive but high-risk carotid plaques, underestimating the true contribution of carotid disease to ischemic stroke.

Recent European Society of Cardiology guidelines and Carotid Plaque–RADS offer improved risk stratification by accounting for plaque features, with evidence showing significant gains in predictive accuracy.

https://ja.ma/4sVWkRs