Surgery

The number of abuse, addiction, and opioid poisoning diagnoses has decreased since the introduction of reformulated OxyContin, according to a study presented at the American Academy of Pain Medicine's 31st Annual Meeting.

Despite a lack of new antibiotics on the market, a study that will be presented at the European Association of Urology conference shows that a change in the way the drugs are used can reduce bacterial resistance.

The reporting of PCI results is not a common practice for many reasons, and while some states require it of their doctors, there could be both medical and political barriers standing in the way of it becoming a nationwide program.

With New York and Massachusetts leading the way laws requiring public reporting of PCI results were recently expanded to Washington State as well. A recent study looked at the risks and benefits of other states starting similar programs.

About two-thirds of surgeons performing mitral valve surgery on patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) do ablation procedures at the same time. There are no official guidelines on when to do both. Trying to provide more information to guide such decisions, a US-Canada team randomized a group of these patients to either valve repair alone, or valve repair with ablation. The dual approach seems better.

Interventional cardiologists would do better to access heart arteries through a patient's arm than groin, a Dutch study found. Though the radial approach is technically more difficult, it is safer with a lower risk of severe bleeding.

With more complex patients anything surgeons can do to ensure success with surgery is a benefit. A recent study looked at how imaging can predict whether cardiac procedures will go well for them and their patients.

Up to 65% of all thyroidectomies are now done as outpatient procedures, and high-volume surgeons have very low complication rate with these surgeries.

Most surgeons refer patients for postoperative physical rehabilitation, but there is little evidence supporting the decision by some to start physical therapy before surgery. An article in the February 2015 issue of Physical Therapy looked at employing physical therapy earlier to prevent complications.

Value-based insurance design (VBID) initiatives are starting to focus on surgery-especially procedures that fall into the "low value" bracket, like hysterectomies and low-back surgery.

Despite advancements in stents, coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) still prevails over balloon angioplasty and stents as the better treatment method for patients with multiple narrowed arteries in the heart.

Patient care continues to make dramatic changes including the way information is shared not only between doctors and patients, but also other doctors treating the same people. Technology making that happen continues to evolve as well.

In patients with heart failure and atrial fibrillation, those who had catheter ablation had better results than those who took the anti-arrhythmic medication amiodarone, reported researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City.

Coronary interventionalists face a wide variety of challenges on a daily basis and as patients post greater problems it is up to the doctors to come up with new ways to treat them.

The TriGuard filter, an investigational device designed to protect the brain from hazardous debris released during transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) and other procedures was found to improve in-hospital safety outcomes and cognitive scores at discharge.

Self-expanding transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) in high-risk aortic stenosis patients produces a more consistent survival rate compared with standard surgery, according to 2-year data presented at the American College of Cardiology meeting in San Diego, CA.

The protein-coding gene FOXO may play a crucial role in defending the heart from coxsackie virus B3, according to researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, NY.

Medical experts have long debated over which obesity parameter holds the strongest cardiovascular predictive value.

Roux-en-Y gastric bypass surgery has been found to decrease cardiovascular risk in obese patients.

Americans' low-fiber diets that tend to be rich in red meats put them at risk for diverticulosis, and by age 60, roughly half of Americans have or have had diverticulosis. It's not clear how many patients with diverticulosis go on to develop diverticulitis, but once diverticulitis develops, 10-25% of patients need surgery, often urgently.

An article in Newsweek highlights a growing trend: travelling to a foreign country to undergo major surgery. Americans are flocking to countries such as Costa Rica, Mexico, India, Thailand, and Mexico, as well as European destinations such as Germany, for affordable surgical procedures.

Does bariatric surgery prolong life? Past research has shown that this surgery initiates sustainable weight loss, sends type 2 diabetes into remission, and reduces cardiovascular disease.

Obese patients looking to lose weight or treat type 2 diabetes have often turned to gastric bypass or other stomach-shrinking surgeries, which have produced favorable results, decreasing cancer risks.

Treatments for women in pain must differ from men's treatment, and often is, according to a study by the American Society of Anesthesiologists.

A simple CHADS2 score, along with records about ongoing use of certain medications, may help physicians predict the risk that individual patients will develop atrial fibrillation after thoracic or vascular surgery.

Researchers report that weight loss and increases in bone turnover were greater after one year among patients who underwent Roux-en-Y gastric bypass compared to patients who had laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding procedures.

When obese patients who want bariatric procedures have a body mass index (BMI) of 50 to 60, surgeons must decide which technique is best. These patients are challenging. About 25% of US patients with obesity are in this group.

Although the prevalence of Barrett's esophagus is considered moderate, the condition is the only established precursor of esophageal adenocarcinoma, and thus it has become the focus of programs of endoscopic screening and surveillance.

A recent JAMA Surgery study by Danielle A. Bischof, MD, of Johns Hopkins University and her American and Canadian colleagues was the first to estimate conditional disease-free survival (CDFS) for primary gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs) following complete surgical resection.

Bariatric surgery has been shown to reduce the long-term risk of diabetes-associated vascular disease in obese patients. According to study results presented at ENDO 2015, bariatric surgery reduced the risk of developing macrovascular events by 20% and reduced the risk of microvascular events by 50%.