University of Washington cardiology professor Dr. Gregory Roth after maternal deaths doubled in 10 years.

Surgeries & Interventions

The First Dissolvable Heart Monitor and Pacer

A team of Northwestern and George Washington scientists took a big step towards revolutionizing how patients are monitored and treated after major cardiac events, unveiling the first dissolvable cardiac mapping and pacing device.

The flexible, transparent, postage stamp-sized device attaches to the surface of the heart and uses sensors and actuators to assess cardiac activity, stream info to monitoring clinicians, and deliver treatments, before dissolving into the body “similar to absorbable stitches” after six weeks. 

That might sound like a dissolvable pacemaker, which would still be impressive, but initial testing shows that it’s capable of far more than current pacemakers. The device…

• Can be placed on more areas of the heart’s surface
• Spatiotemporally maps a range of electrical activity (EG and optically), showing which exact areas of the heart are (or aren’t) functioning.
• Delivers electrical stimuli to targeted areas to quickly stop atrial fibrillation or AV blocks, and maps how this pacing affects different parts of the heart.
• Uses a transparent design to ensure that the device won’t interfere with optical diagnostics/therapies and other image-guided procedures.

Plus, its bioresorbable design means that it doesn’t have to be extracted after the monitoring period, reducing costs and complications associated with removal procedures.

Noting that one-third of heart disease deaths in the U.S. result from complications that occur during the initial months after a major cardiac event, the researchers have big ambitions for their unique new device. 

• As you might expect, they believe it could significantly improve short-term monitoring and treatments for patients recovering from MACE and cardiac surgeries, without requiring removal surgeries after their recovery is complete. 
• They also see the technologies and methods they used supporting other breakthroughs, including the development of new therapies, guiding surgical procedures, and for other forms of postoperative monitoring.

The Takeaway
Although a lot more R&D and RCTs will be needed before clinical use is even a possibility, this device’s potential to address some of the biggest challenges with post-MACE care and current pacemaker technology seems to be worth waiting for. And given the related advances we’re seeing in pacemaker materials and dissolvability, we could be seeing a wave of similar innovations in the coming years.

PIA Medical Processes It All

Need an analysis like calcium scoring, strain or even FFR? PIA Medical began as a Core Lab and can handle creative cardiac research and clinical trials along with the full breadth of clinical analyses available today.

Register Now: Current TAVR Trends for Bicuspid Anatomy on July 17.

Join our expert faculty for a live, case-based discussion on July 17 at 7:30 p.m. ET. Over the course of 90 minutes, we will discuss strategies for bicuspid cases and contemporary sizing methods. Register now!

The Wire

• Neko’s Whole-Body Funding: Swedish whole-body scanning startup Neko Health raised $65M in Series A funding to fast-track its expansion across Europe and the US. Neko was co-founded by Spotify CEO Daniel Ek, and plans to offer a reasonable $270 per-scan rate to assist physicians with early disease detection (even though many physicians seem to hate this idea). In addition to skin and blood tests, Neko’s “all-in-one” device measures a range of cardiovascular parameters (ECG, murmur echo, BP, arterial stiffness, and more). 

• Pegozafermin Controls Hypertriglyceridemia: A study in Nature Medicine found that pegozafermin dramatically improves triglyceride (TG) levels and other cardiometabolic parameters in patients with severe hypertriglyceridemia (SHTG). The 8-week trial (n=85) compared four different doses of pegozafermin to placebo, finding that TGs were significantly reduced across all pegozafermin doses. Nearly 80% of pegozafermin-takers achieved TG levels below 500 mg/dl, the threshold for hypertriglyceridemia. The investigational drug also reduced levels of ApoB, non-HDL cholesterol, and liver fat.

• AI Marketing Hype: As you might have guessed, you can’t always believe the hype when it comes to marketing for healthcare AI. A new JAMA review found that marketing materials for 20% of the 119 AI solutions that gained FDA clearance between November 2021 and March 2022 are inconsistent with the language in their regulatory submissions. Twenty-three of the reviewed AI solutions were for cardiovascular indications, four of which used marketing language that was “discrepant” or “contentious” with their FDA submissions.

• AMI Patients With No SMuRFs at Greater Risk: An AHA study found that individuals suffering from acute myocardial infarction (AMI) with no standard modifiable CV risk factors (SMuRFs, such as diabetes, hypertension, smoking, hypercholesterolemia) are less likely to receive interventions and face higher mortality risks. Among 20.5k AMI patients, the 3.6% of patients without documented SMuRFs were less likely to receive CVD medications or to undergo angiography and revascularization. They also had higher adjusted mortality rates both 28 days (odds ratio: 3.23) and one year (hazard ratio: 2.09) after AMI hospitalization. 

• PwC: Healthcare Costs Projected to Rise 7%: PwC’s annual medical cost report is out, and it’s forecasting a 7% increase in U.S. healthcare costs in 2024. That’s up from a 5.5% increase in 2022 and 6% in 2023, with PwC attributing the acceleration to inflation, rising labor expenses, the post-COVID procedure surge, and higher pharmacy expenses.

• Altamira & Heqet’s Cardiac Regeneration Alliance: Heqet Therapeutics announced that it will use Altamira Therapeutics’ OligoPhore RNA delivery platform with its investigational cardiac tissue regeneration therapies. Heqet will initially use the OligoPhore platform to test nanoparticles on animal models with myocardial infarction-damaged heart tissue. If successful, Heqet might license Altamira’s technology to develop cardiac regeneration therapeutics.

• Maternal Mortality Doubles: A JAMA study found that the U.S. maternal mortality rate (MMR) more than doubled from 1999 to 2019 (505 to 1,210 maternal deaths), with cardiology-related conditions playing a central role. Black women remained the most impacted (from 26.7 to 55.4 deaths per 1k live births), while MMRs among American Indian/Alaska Native women and White women sharply increased (14 to 49.2 &  9.4 to 26.3 per 1k). Cardiovascular disease, severe pre-eclampsia, and maternal cardiac disease were listed among the biggest MMR risk factors.

• Chest X-Ray AI Detects Heart Disease: Could AI turn the common chest X-ray into a heart imaging tool? In a new article in Lancet Digital Health, researchers from Japan describe how they tested an AI algorithm that classifies cardiac function and valvular disease on chest radiographs. After training the model on over 22k chest X-rays from nearly 17k patients, they found it was able to characterize six types of valvular heart disease with AUCs ranging from 0.83 to 0.92.

• CMS Proposes 2.2% Home Health Cut: CMS published its 2024 HH PPS Rate Update proposed rule, which included a 2.2% cut to Medicare home health payments, or about ~$375 million less than 2023’s levels. Unsurprisingly, home health advocates seem to be universally upset about these cuts. The same is likely true for those focused on home cardiac care, which was mentioned a whopping 49 times in the CMS report.

• BIOTRONIK Amvia Edge’s FDA Approval: BIOTRONIK announced the FDA approval of its new Amvia Edge pacemaker and cardiac resynchronization therapy pacemaker (CRT-P) family. The Amvia Edge is the market’s smallest single-chamber MR conditional pacemaker, and leverages BIOTRONIK’s proprietary MRI Guard 24/7 technology to automatically recognize when a patient enters an MRI field and then converts the device to MRI mode. The Amvia Edge devices also feature Atrial ATP, which provides multiple automatic therapies when it detects stable atrial arrhythmias.

• Statin Therapy for Dialysis Patients: A new study out of South Korea provided the first evidence that statin therapy reduces all-cause mortality risks among patients with ASCVD who are receiving dialysis. Among the 17,242 dialysis patients, the 55.7% of patients who were prescribed statins had a lower adjusted risk of all-cause mortality during a mean follow-up of 32.6 months (hazard ratio: 0.92). However, statin users had higher adjusted cardiac mortality rates (HR: 1.12), which is consistent with previous statin studies in this population.

Start Measuring What Matters

Looking to optimize your cardiovascular imaging services, but don’t know what to measure? Check out this Change Healthcare report for insights on how to track and evaluate your cardiovascular imaging performance, assess quality, and enhance operational efficiency. Read the full article now and start measuring what matters!

HeartFlow Analysis Streamlines Care

Faced with cath lab inefficiencies and an increased reliance on stress testing, Cone Health pursued a more advanced solution. See how the HeartFlow FFRct Analysis allowed Cone Health to improve the patient journey through streamlined CAD testing.

The Resource Wire

• The expansion of remote cardiac patient monitoring is creating more care opportunities, but also new operational challenges for cardiology teams. Check out this Cardiac Wire Show, where ARTELLA Solutions’ Jacinta Fitzsimons shares how the right combination of technology and service can help physicians get the most out of their cardiac RPM programs – today and into the future.

• New technology from Us2.ai called Us2.connect allows you to add AI automation to any echo device. Any echo machine can now have 100% automated reporting with disease detection and editable measurements – all generated in realtime as you scan.

• “I could have had a heart attack.” Florida-based registered nurse, Sharon Bruno BSN, RN, had a zero CAC Score and no known heart disease symptoms, but she learned through Cleerly’s AI-enabled CCTA analysis that she actually had moderate plaque burden. See how Sharon’s proactive detection allowed her to make lifestyle changes early enough to reduce her CVD risks.