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Chest pain presentations to the emergency department (ED) are common and very costly to the health care system. Although the event rates are low in patients with a low clinical risk profile, the price of a missed diagnosis is high. Some low-risk patients who are discharged from the ED may suffer a myocardial infarction (MI) and potentially even die.
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atients with diabetes mellitus (DM) are at increased risk of developing acute coronary syndromes (ACS). Furthermore, after hospitalization with ACS, patients with DM are at increased risk of suffering repeat hospitalization for ACS. In recent years, a number of trials have tested the strategy of routine early invasive approach (i.e., diagnostic angiography with a view to revascularization) vs an early conservative strategy (i.e., medical management with coronary angiography only performed in cases of refractory ischemia).
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Early surgery for infective endocarditis (IE) has been supported by several observational studies, but the lack of randomized, controlled data has led to conflicting recommendations by major societies.
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In an effort to reduce unnecessary testing, these investigators performed a retrospective observational study of 671 TEE-guided direct current cardioversions (DCC) for atrial fibrillation (AF) to evaluate the indications used for TEE and the outcomes with regard to thromboembolism post DCC.
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Concentric left ventricular hypertrophy (CLVH) is occasionally unexplained. Thus, these investigators from Beijing, China, sought evidence for Danon disease, a glycogen storage disease, in patients being evaluated for cLVH who underwent endomyocardial biopsy.
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Medical therapy is the mainstay of treatment for coronary artery disease (CAD), resulting in improved clinical outcomes. Revascularization with percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), in addition to medical therapy, improves symptoms in patients with stable CAD.
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This study reports data from the International Collaboration on Endocarditis-Prospective Cohort Study (ICE-PCS) on the clinical characteristics of infective endocarditis related to pacemakers and ICDs.
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The Riata and Riata ST ICD leads manufactured by St. Jude Medical have recently come under increased scrutiny because of the observation that the conductor cables could extrude from the outer insulation.
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It is well known that the risk of perioperative major adverse cardiac events (MACE) is high in patients with coronary stents, especially early after stent implantation.