Preoperative planning using virtual reality for percutaneous transseptal valve-in-valve transcatheter mitral valve replacement: a case report.

Background: Virtual reality (VR) technology has been implemented as a pre-procedural planning tool for cardiovascular interventions to enable detailed evaluation of patient anatomy from different vantage points. Here, we employed a VR platform to preoperatively plan for percutaneous valve-in-valve transcatheter mitral replacement (ViV-TMVR) in a prohibitive surgical candidate.

Case Summary: An 85-year-old male with a history of two prior sternotomies for bioprosthetic aortic valve (AV) and mitral valve (MV) 31 mm Medtronic Mosaic bioprosthesis presented with severe mitral regurgitation from a degenerative bioprosthetic MV.

Optical polarization-based seismic and water wave sensing on transoceanic cables.

Seafloor geophysical instrumentation is challenging to deploy and maintain but critical for studying submarine earthquakes and Earth's interior. Emerging fiber-optic sensing technologies that can leverage submarine telecommunication cables present an opportunity to fill the data gap. We successfully sensed seismic and water waves over a 10,000-kilometer-long submarine cable connecting Los Angeles, California, and Valparaiso, Chile, by monitoring the polarization of regular optical telecommunication channels.

Seismic anisotropy reveals crustal flow driven by mantle vertical loading in the Pacific NW.

Buoyancy anomalies within Earth's mantle create large convective currents that are thought to control the evolution of the lithosphere. While tectonic plate motions provide evidence for this relation, the mechanism by which mantle processes influence near-surface tectonics remains elusive. Here, we present an azimuthal anisotropy model for the Pacific Northwest crust that strongly correlates with high-velocity structures in the underlying mantle but shows no association with the regional mantle flow field.

Simultaneous right ventricular to pulmonary artery pressure gradient measurement using a single venous access technique.

Purpose: The pullback gradient technique is commonly used to evaluate pulmonic stenosis; however, it only represents a one-time measurement of valvular stenosis. Instead, simultaneous peak-to-peak gradients account for the data variability being best suited to discern the severity of the stenosis, but requires two different venous accesses. Here, we demonstrate the feasibility and high fidelity hemodynamic tracings of a new technique for evaluation of pulmonary valve stenosis by using a single venous access.

Systematic review of interventions to repair ascending aortic pseudoaneurysms.

Background: The safety and efficacy of endovascular therapies for ascending aortic pseudoaneurysms (AAPs) are still controversial.

Methods: We report an endovascular correction of an AAP in a high-risk surgical patient and present the results of a literature review focusing on AAP treatment strategies. A multilingual search of AAP therapy was performed with limiting dates of January 1980 to May 2014.

[Core competencies in public health: a regional framework for the Americas].

The response is described to the 2010 call from the Pan American Health Organization to develop a Regional Framework on Core Competencies in Public Health, with a view to supporting the efforts of the countries in the Americas to build public health systems capacity as a strategy for optimal performance of the Essential Public Health Functions. The methodological process for the response was divided into four phases. In the first, a team of experts was convened who defined the methodology to be used during a workshop at the National Institute of Public Health of Mexico in 2010.

Consideration of patient age and life expectancy in implantable cardioverter-defibrillator referral.

Background: Primary prevention implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) guidelines recommend device consideration for at-risk patients with a life expectancy of greater than 1 year regardless of age. We sought to assess the influence of patient age and prognosis on ICD referral.

Methods: A survey was mailed to a random, national sample of 3,000 physicians in the specialties of cardiology, family medicine, and internal medicine.

Referring physicians' discordance with the primary prevention implantable cardioverter-defibrillator guidelines: a national survey.

Background: The American College of Cardiology, the American Heart Association, and the Heart Rhythm Society guidelines provide patient selection criteria for primary prevention implantable cardioverter-defibrillators (ICDs). For unknown reasons, guideline-discordant practice is common.

Objective: To determine referring physicians' concordance with the primary prevention ICD guidelines.

Increasing surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy effect of RNA and DNA components by changing the pH of silver colloidal suspensions.

This work focused on establishing the parameters for enhancing the Raman signals of DNA and RNA constituents: nitrogenous bases, nucleosides and nucleotides, using metallic nanoparticles as surface enhanced Raman scattering substrates. Silver nanospheres were synthesized using sodium borohydride as a reducing agent and sodium citrate as a capping agent. The prepared nanoparticles had a surface plasmon band at ∼384nm and an average size of 12±3nm.

Impaired S-nitrosylation of the ryanodine receptor caused by xanthine oxidase activity contributes to calcium leak in heart failure.

S-Nitrosylation is a ubiquitous post-translational modification that regulates diverse biologic processes. In skeletal muscle, hypernitrosylation of the ryanodine receptor (RyR) causes sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) calcium leak, but whether abnormalities of cardiac RyR nitrosylation contribute to dysfunction of cardiac excitation-contraction coupling remains controversial. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that cardiac RyR2 is hyponitrosylated in heart failure, because of nitroso-redox imbalance.

SolidFlex--the fourth generation in endoscopy.

Objectives: To design and develop the fourth generation in endoscopy after the rigid, semirigid and flexible instruments. This next generation technology has been named SolidFlex, and it was designed by a surgeon based on many years of research with the objective to provide easier and faster solutions for physicians when performing endoscopic procedures.

Methods: This new endoscope called SolidFlex has been brought to light with the latest technology to provide surgeons of every age the capabilities to carry out any possible endoscopic procedure.