Publications by authors named "Koehler F"

Article Synopsis
  • * Germany has taken a leading role in implementing telemedicine for CHF, resulting in improved patient quality of life and fewer hospitalizations, supported by governmental backing and substantial research evidence.
  • * This review analyzes the evolution of telemonitoring for CHF in Germany, highlighting key studies and the journey towards integrating telemedicine into standard care for high-risk patients.
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  • Deep brain stimulation has greatly advanced the treatment of neurological and psychiatric disorders, and there's interest in finding less invasive alternatives.
  • The study focuses on magnetoelectric nanodiscs (MENDs) that can convert magnetic fields into electric signals to modulate neurons remotely, showing effective results even below traditional stimulation thresholds.
  • When injected into specific brain regions of mice, MENDs can control behaviors related to reward and movement, paving the way for new applications in neuroscience research and therapy.
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  • Remote patient management can enhance heart failure prognosis, but current methods for monitoring require too many resources for widespread use.
  • A study developed a machine learning model to create a risk score predicting heart failure hospitalizations within seven days, and this model performed better than traditional methods in identifying at-risk patients.
  • By focusing daily review efforts on just the top third of patients with the highest risk scores, the model could detect 95% of imminent hospitalizations, highlighting its potential to streamline monitoring and intervention processes.
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  • - This study analyzes the effects of mitral transcatheter edge-to-edge repair (M-TEER) on hospitalization rates for patients with functional mitral regurgitation (FMR) and symptomatic heart failure (HF), aiming to clarify conflicting results from previous research.
  • - The results indicate that patients who underwent M-TEER experienced significantly lower rates of recurrent heart failure hospitalizations and cardiovascular (CV) deaths over a 24-month period, as well as an improved quality of life compared to those in the control group.
  • - Specifically, patients in the M-TEER group spent fewer days in the hospital due to HF or CV issues, with a statistically significant reduction in total days lost due to these health complications.
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  • The study examined the effectiveness of transcatheter mitral-valve repair in patients suffering from heart failure and functional mitral regurgitation, comparing it to standard medical therapy.
  • In a trial with 505 patients, results showed that those who received the device had significantly lower rates of hospitalizations for heart failure and cardiovascular death compared to those who only received medical therapy.
  • Additionally, patients in the device group experienced a greater improvement in health status, as measured by the Kansas City Cardiomyopathy Questionnaire, indicating better outcomes with the transcatheter procedure.
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Telemedical care concepts provide opportunities to improve the care of patients with chronic heart failure (CHF). The current state of telemedical technologies enables the effective monitoring of the disease. Germany is one of the first European countries with an entitlement to telemedical supporting care for CHF patients.

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Article Synopsis
  • - The TIM-HF2 study showed that remote patient management (RPM) significantly reduces the number of days lost due to hospital admissions or death in heart failure (HF) patients, particularly those with diabetes, with hazard ratios indicating improved outcomes.
  • - In a follow-up analysis including 707 HF patients with diabetes, RPM led to a notable decrease in unplanned cardiovascular hospitalizations and all-cause mortality compared to usual care, along with enhanced quality of life as measured by the Minnesota Living with Heart Failure Questionnaire.
  • - Overall, the findings support implementing RPM for heart failure patients with diabetes to improve health outcomes and quality of life, indicating its effectiveness in a specific high-risk population.
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Purpose Of Review: The role of nutrition in organ health including solid organ transplantation is broadly accepted, but robust data on nutritional regimens remains scarce calling for further investigation of specific dietary approaches at the different stages of organ transplantation. This review gives an update on the latest insights into nutritional interventions highlighting the potential of specific dietary regimens prior to transplantation aiming for organ protection and the interplay between dietary intake and gut microbiota.

Recent Findings: Nutrition holds the potential to optimize patients' health prior to and after surgery, it may enhance patients' ability to cope with the procedure-associated stress and it may accelerate their recovery from surgery.

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Aim: The RESHAPE-HF2 trial is designed to assess the efficacy and safety of the MitraClip device system for the treatment of clinically important functional mitral regurgitation (FMR) in patients with heart failure (HF). This report describes the baseline characteristics of patients enrolled in the RESHAPE-HF2 trial compared to those enrolled in the COAPT and MITRA-FR trials.

Methods And Results: The RESHAPE-HF2 study is an investigator-initiated, prospective, randomized, multicentre trial including patients with symptomatic HF, a left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) between 20% and 50% with moderate-to-severe or severe FMR, for whom isolated mitral valve surgery was not recommended.

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Although people commonly remember and recreate the tempo of musical pieces with high accuracy, comparatively less is known regarding sources of potential variation in musical tempo memory. This study therefore aimed to investigate musical tempo memory accuracy and the effects of reference tempo, reproduction method, musical expertise, and their interaction. A sample of 403 individuals with varying levels of musical training participated in the experimental online study, including nonmusicians, amateur musicians, and professional musicians.

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Societies are exposed to major challenges at an increasing pace. This underscores the need for preventive measures such as resilience promotion that should be available in time and without access barriers. Our systematic review summarizes evidence on digital resilience interventions, which have the potential to meet these demands.

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Aims: The majority of patients with severe aortic stenosis (AS) planned for transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) are elective outpatients. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the time between the heart team's decision and TAVI increased due to limited healthcare resources. We therefore implemented telemedical approaches to identify AS patients at risk for clinical deterioration during the waiting time.

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Article Synopsis
  • Implantable devices help patients with heart failure by working alongside medicines to treat the condition and improve their health.
  • While some devices are supported by strong evidence and show positive effects, others need more research before they can be widely used.
  • The Heart Failure Association and European Heart Rhythm Association suggest a better way to use these devices in care programs to help patients more effectively.
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Deep-brain stimulation (DBS) with implanted electrodes revolutionized treatment of movement disorders and empowered neuroscience studies. Identifying less invasive alternatives to DBS may further extend its clinical and research applications. Nanomaterial-mediated transduction of magnetic fields into electric potentials offers an alternative to invasive DBS.

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Background: Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infections are a common complication after kidney transplantation (KTx) and negatively affecting patient outcome. Valganciclovir (VGC) prophylaxis is often limited by drug-induced side effects and dose reduction due to decline in kidney function.

Method: In the present study, episodes of CMV viremia in the first year after KTx in a cohort of 316 recipients were analyzed retrospectively to identify risk factors linked to persistent infections.

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The widespread adoption of mobile technologies offers an opportunity for a new approach to post-discharge care for patients with heart failure (HF). By enabling non-invasive remote monitoring and two-way, real-time communication between the clinic and home-based patients, as well as a host of other capabilities, mobile technologies have a potential to significantly improve remote patient care. This literature review summarizes clinical evidence related to virtual healthcare (VHC), defined as a care team + connected devices + a digital solution in post-release care of patients with HF.

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Engagement with music has the capacity to influence and be influenced by affective experiences. Although cross-sectional and experimental research provides evidence that music engagement is related to higher positive and lower negative affect, few studies have investigated the bidirectional nature of this relationship over time. The present longitudinal study, therefore, examined the interplay between passive and active music engagement and affect using random-intercept cross-lagged panel analysis.

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Background: The randomized controlled clinical trial "TIM-HF2" investigated the benefit of telemonitoring in chronic heart failure. The health economic evaluation of this intervention was based on routine data from statutory health insurance (SHI) funds. Since participants were recruited independently of their SHI affiliation, there was a large number of potential data-providing SHI funds.

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Aims: The benefit of non-invasive remote patient management (RPM) for patients with heart failure (HF) has been demonstrated. We evaluated the effect of left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) on treatment outcomes in the TIM-HF2 (Telemedical Interventional Management in Heart Failure II; NCT01878630) randomized trial.

Methods And Results: TIM-HF2 was a prospective, randomized, multicentre trial investigating the effect of a structured RPM intervention versus usual care in patients who had been hospitalized for HF within 12 months before randomization.

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Broad adoption of magnetic soft robotics is hampered by the sophisticated field paradigms for their manipulation and the complexities in controlling multiple devices. Furthermore, high-throughput fabrication of such devices across spatial scales remains challenging. Here, advances in fiber-based actuators and magnetic elastomer composites are leveraged to create 3D magnetic soft robots controlled by unidirectional fields.

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Although the development of therapies and tools for the improved management of heart failure (HF) continues apace, day-to-day management in clinical practice is often far from ideal. A Cardiovascular Round Table workshop was convened by the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) to identify barriers to the optimal implementation of therapies and guidelines and to consider mitigation strategies to improve patient outcomes in the future. Key challenges identified included the complexity of HF itself and its treatment, financial constraints and the perception of HF treatments as costly, failure to meet the needs of patients, suboptimal outpatient management, and the fragmented nature of healthcare systems.

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Graphical AbstractAdherence to cardiac rehabilitation following a primary event has been demonstrated to improve quality of life, increase functional capacity, and decrease hospitalizations and mortality. Mobile technologies offer an opportunity to improve both the quality and utilization of cardiac rehabilitation, and recent clinical studies investigated this technology. This literature review summarizes the current use of mobile health, wearable activity monitors (WAMs), and other multi-component technologies deployed to support home-based virtual cardiac rehabilitation.

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Background/objective: Several factors associated with resilience as the maintenance of mental health despite stress exposure can be strengthened through participation in leisure time activities. Since many people listen to or make music in their leisure time, the aim of the present study was to provide insights into the architecture of how resilience relates to passive and active music engagement.

Method: 511 participants regularly listening to and/or making music completed an online survey on resilient outcomes (i.

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