An increasing number of patients have angina that is refractory to maximal medical therapy and unable to be addressed with revascularization procedures. Prior small studies have suggested the promise of generating a pressure gradient upstream of the myocardial venous drainage system to relieve angina. This can be accomplished through the percutaneous implantation of a device […]
Tag: angina
Ivabradine ineffective as add-on therapy for stable ischemic heart disease
Ivabradine reduces heart rate without affecting blood pressure or left ventricular systolic performance. Given studies demonstrating a relationship between heart rate and cardiovascular risk, modifying heart rate with ivabradine may reduce risk in patients with coronary disease. In the Study Assessing the Morbidity–Mortality Benefits of the If Inhibitor Ivabradine in Patients with Coronary Artery Disease […]
Exercise caution when using treadmill ECGs for angina assessment
Prompt assessment and risk stratification is fundamental to the early management of patients presenting for the first time with suspected angina. Within the setting of rapid access chest pain clinics (RACPC), risk stratification is traditionally achieved by history taking, examination, resting ECG and exercise ECG (ex-ECG). However, it remains unclear whether the inclusion of resting […]
ARIA suggests diagnostic angiography underused
Deciding which patients presenting with chest pain should undergo diagnostic coronary angiography (DCA) is an everyday dilemma for the cardiologist. In the ARIA (Appropriateness of Referral and Invesigation of Angina) study, Hemingway and colleagues used scoring criteria, based on patient-specific characteristics and validated by 2 panels of experts made up of 22 UK physicians, in […]