News from the ACC and a new design for Cardiology Review

This month’s edition of Cardiology Review introduces a new and updated page design, featuring an easier-to-read type face and graphical elements to help you navigate through the sections. Don’t hesitate to let us know what you think about it. Send your comments to cardiologyreview@ascendmedia.com.

We’ve also included an expanded News Beat section with synopses from trials presented at the American College of Cardiology (ACC) Annual Scientific Session 2005.

In our first CME feature this month in the heart failure section, Dr. Eduardo R. Perna and colleagues from Argentina analyze the value of cardiac enzyme monitoring in identifying heart failure patients with high risk for ongoing myocardial injury. Worsening congestive heart failure was often associated with cardiac enzyme elevations, a finding that Dr. William C. Little finds interesting in his commentary on this important study.

This issue also features, as our second CME article, an overview in the hypertension section by Dr. Mohan Rao on the relative value of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors compared with angiotensin receptor blockers, in managing high blood pressure.

In the diabetes section, Dr. Emiliana Ferramosca and associates evaluate the prognostic role of coronary artery calcium screening in over 10,000 asymptomatic individuals, of whom 903 were diabetic. Subjects without coronary artery calcium had a lower short-term risk of death even if they were diabetic. Dr. Steven Borzak is our commentator for this article.

In a combined lipid disorders and CAD/

angina section report, Drs. Meeradevi Kondapaneni and Frederick A. Spencer evaluate the anti-inflammatory effect of statin therapy on nearly 20,000 patients with acute coronary syndromes. Although this was not a randomized trial, the therapeutic benefits were impressive, as Dr. Richard J. Katz notes in his commentary.