Psychoactive drug use and prognosis in patients with cancer presenting with acute cardiovascular disease.

Background: The psychoactive drug consumption and the short- and long-term cardiovascular prognosis of patients with cancer admitted for acute cardiovascular events are not well established.

Aims: To assess the prevalence of psychoactive drug use, in-hospital outcomes and 1-year prognosis in patients with cancer hospitalized for acute cardiovascular events.

Methods: In a prospective multicentre study of all consecutive patients admitted to intensive cardiac care units, a history of cancer was recorded systematically.

Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) during aplasia: A bridge towards myopericarditis recovery after autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplant for systemic sclerosis and recent Coronarovirus disease (COVID-19) vaccination.

Systemic sclerosis (SSc) is a rare autoimmune disease (AD), characterised by early diffuse vasculopathy, activation of the immune response and progressive skin and internal organ fibrosis. In severe progressive diffuse SSc (dSSc), autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (aHSCT) improves survival, despite its own risk of complications and transplant related mortality (TRM). We present herein the case of a dSSc patient undergoing aHSCT with low dose cyclophosphamide conditioning and sudden acute myopericarditis and cardiogenic shock, four weeks after a second mRNA SARS-CoV-2 vaccine (Pfizer) injection.

Prognostic value of soluble ST2 in AL and TTR cardiac amyloidosis: a multicenter study.

Background: Both light-chain (AL) amyloidosis and transthyretin (ATTR) amyloidosis are types of cardiac amyloidosis (CA) that require accurate prognostic stratification to plan therapeutic strategies and follow-ups. Cardiac biomarkers, e.g.

Clinical Implementation of Different Strategies for Exercise-Based Rehabilitation in Kidney and Liver Transplant Recipients: A Pilot Study.

Background: Cardiovascular disease is among the leading causes of death in solid organ transplant recipients with a functional graft. Although these patients could theoretically benefit from exercise-based rehabilitation (EBR) programs, their implementation is a challenge.

Objective: We present our initial experience on different delivery modes of a pilot EBR program in kidney and liver transplant recipients.

Cardiac remodeling in amateur triathletes after 24 weeks of exercise training for a half-Ironman event: a brief report.

Background: Triathletes' physiological adaptations to exercise training can have a different impact on cardiac remodeling based on the extreme exercise preparation. Moreover, cardiac remodeling might be different depending on whether triathletes have trained for many years or if they just decided to be more active. Nevertheless, data are limited in amateur endurance athletes and studies about them are key for their safety.

Life expectancy and burden of late complications after reduced intensity conditioning allogeneic transplantation.

Reduced intensity conditionings (RIC) before after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) allow older or unfit patients of being transplanted, but survival expectancy and burden of late complications are poorly described in this setting. All patients (N = 456) who were alive and relapse-free 2 years after HSCT following RIC were included. Cumulative incidences (CI), standardized incidence, or mortality, ratio (SIR or SMR), and competing risk models were used.

Diastolic Function Assessment of Left and Right Ventricles by MRI in Systemic Sclerosis Patients.

Background: Heart involvement is frequent although often clinically silent in systemic sclerosis (SSc) patients. Early identification of cardiac involvement can be improved by noninvasive methods such as MRI, in addition to transthoracic echocardiography (TTE).

Purpose: To assess the ability of phase-contrast (PC)-MRI to detect subclinical left (LV) and right (RV) ventricular diastolic dysfunction in SSc patients.

Delayed acute myocarditis and COVID-19-related multisystem inflammatory syndrome.

Precise descriptions of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-related cardiac damage as well as underlying mechanisms are scarce. We describe clinical presentation and diagnostic workup of acute myocarditis in a patient who had developed COVID-19 syndrome 1 month earlier. A healthy 40-year-old man suffered from typical COVID-19 symptoms.

Prognostic value of cardiopulmonary exercise testing in cardiac amyloidosis.

Aims: In amyloid patients, cardiac involvement dramatically worsens functional capacity and prognosis. We sought to study how the cardiopulmonary exercise test (CPET) could help in functional assessment and risk stratification of patients with cardiac amyloidosis (CA).

Methods And Results: We carried out a multicentre study including patients with light chain (AL) or transthyretin (TTR) CA.

Diagnostic score of cardiac involvement in AL amyloidosis.

Aims: Early diagnosis of cardiac involvement is a key issue in the management of AL amyloidosis. Our objective was to establish a diagnostic score of cardiac involvement in AL amyloidosis and to compare it with the current consensus criteria [i.e.

Subclinical Left Ventricular Dysfunction During Chemotherapy.

Subclinical left ventricular dysfunction is the most common cardiac complication after chemotherapy administration. Detection and early treatment are major issues for better cardiac outcomes in this cancer population. The most common definition of cardiotoxicity is a 10-percentage point decrease of left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) to a value <53%.

A Dual Tissue-Doppler Optical-Flow Method for Speckle Tracking Echocardiography at High Frame Rate.

A coupled computational method for recovering tissue velocity vector fields from high-frame-rate echocardiography is described. Conventional transthoracic echocardiography provides limited temporal resolution, which may prevent accurate estimation of the 2-D myocardial velocity field dynamics. High-frame-rate compound echocardiography using diverging waves with integrated motion compensation has been shown to provide concurrent high-resolution B-mode and tissue Doppler imaging (TDI).

Coupling Myocardium and Vortex Dynamics in Diverging-Wave Echocardiography.

Echocardiography is widely used to provide critical left ventricular indices describing myocardial motion and blood inflow velocity. Tissue motion and blood flow are strongly connected and interdependent in the ventricle. During cardiac relaxation, rapid filling leads to the formation of a vortical blood flow pattern.

High-Frame-Rate Speckle-Tracking Echocardiography.

Conventional echocardiography is the leading modality for noninvasive cardiac imaging. It has been recently illustrated that high-frame-rate echocardiography using diverging waves could improve cardiac assessment. The spatial resolution and contrast associated with this method are commonly improved by coherent compounding of steered beams.

High body mass index is a predictor of left ventricular reverse remodelling in heart failure with reduced ejection fraction.

Aims: Structural and functional left ventricular alterations can occur in heart failure (HF), referred to as left ventricular reverse remodelling (LVRR). This study aimed to define novel predictors of LVRR besides well-known effects of medical and device therapy.

Methods And Results: From echographic database, we included 295 patients with both left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) ≤45% and indexed left ventricular end-diastolic diameter ≥33 mm/m and who had at least two echocardiographic exams with a delay between 3 and 12 months.

Intracardiac Vortex Dynamics by High-Frame-Rate Doppler Vortography-In Vivo Comparison With Vector Flow Mapping and 4-D Flow MRI.

Recent studies have suggested that intracardiac vortex flow imaging could be of clinical interest to early diagnose the diastolic heart function. Doppler vortography has been introduced as a simple color Doppler method to detect and quantify intraventricular vortices. This method is able to locate a vortex core based on the recognition of an antisymmetric pattern in the Doppler velocity field.

[From BNP to ST2: Which biomarkers to use in practice?].

The management of heart failure requires reproducible and easily accessible biomarkers. For diagnosis, measurement of natriuretic peptides is highly recommended as first line. For the stratification of patients, natriuretic peptide testing is highly recommended and other biomarkers such as troponin or fibrosis markers can also be used.

Loss of Notch3 Signaling in Vascular Smooth Muscle Cells Promotes Severe Heart Failure Upon Hypertension.

Hypertension, which is a risk factor of heart failure, provokes adaptive changes at the vasculature and cardiac levels. Notch3 signaling plays an important role in resistance arteries by controlling the maturation of vascular smooth muscle cells. Notch3 deletion is protective in pulmonary hypertension while deleterious in arterial hypertension.

Prognostic markers of acute decompensated heart failure: the emerging roles of cardiac biomarkers and prognostic scores.

Rapidly assessing outcome in patients with acute decompensated heart failure is important but prognostic factors may differ from those used routinely for stable chronic heart failure. Multiple plasma biomarkers, besides the classic natriuretic peptides, have recently emerged as potential prognosticators. Furthermore, prognostic scores that combine clinical and biochemical data may also be useful.