Contemporary practices in postcardiac arrest syndrome: the role of mild therapeutic hypothermia.

Out-of-hospital cardiac arrest remains a major cause of mortality and morbidity despite progress in resuscitative practices. The number of survivors with severe neurological impairment at hospital discharge is similarly dismal. Recently, much attention has been directed toward the use of mild therapeutic hypothermia in the care of comatose survivors with postcardiac arrest syndrome.

Association of neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin with the severity of coronary artery disease.

Serum neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL) concentrations were measured in 73 consecutive patients who underwent first-time angiography for suspected coronary artery disease (CAD), and their associations with angiographic indexes of the severity of CAD (i.e., number of diseased vessels and modified Gensini score) were estimated.

Comparison of long versus short ("spot") drug-eluting stenting for long coronary stenoses.

We compared spot drug-eluting stenting (DES) to full stent coverage for treatment of long coronary stenoses. Consecutive, consenting patients with a long (>20 mm) coronary lesion of nonuniform severity and indication for percutaneous coronary intervention were randomized to full stent coverage of the atherosclerotic lesion with multiple, overlapping stenting (full DES group, n = 90) or spot stenting of hemodynamically significant parts of the lesion only (defined as diameter stenosis >50%; spot DES group, n = 89). At 1-year follow-up, 14 patients with full DES (15.

Three-dimensional analysis of vulnerable segments in the left anterior descending artery.

Objectives: Analysis of conventional angiograms has suggested that specific anatomic parameters of particular segments of a coronary artery render them prone to vulnerable plaque development, plaque rupture, and consequent thrombosis. This study aimed at performing a three-dimensional analysis of recanalized left anterior descending (LAD) coronary arteries in patients who had suffered an anterior ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI).

Methods: Coronary angiograms of 76 consecutive patients with an anterior STEMI and a recanalized LAD were reconstructed in the three-dimensional space, and compared with angiograms of 76 patients with stable coronary artery disease (SCAD) and significant LAD stenosis.

Complex fractionated atrial electrograms at anatomic sites of ganglionated plexi in atrial fibrillation.

Aims: To investigate the relationship of complex fractionated atrial electrograms (CFAEs) with the activity of the ganglionated plexi (GP) in the cardiac autonomic nervous system.

Methods And Results: Thirty-two patients (aged 55 +/- 10 years, five females) scheduled for circumferential ablation for paroxysmal atrial fibrillation (AF) were studied. Mapping of CFAEs during AF was performed at the left atrium (LA) and pulmonary vein-atrial junctions, particularly at the locations where GP are commonly located.