Jan 22, 2014

The Particulars: Drug-eluting bioresorbable vascular scaffolds (BVS)—which naturally dissolve into the blood stream within 18 to 24 months—have been found to effectively treat coronary artery dise...

Jan 22, 2014

Emergency and trauma surgeries are increasingly being performed by the same providers, often using the same resources. It has been implied that improvements in care for one of these populations could ...

Jan 21, 2014

The Particulars: The EkoSonic Endovascular System is a device that uses ultrasound to accelerate the action of anticoagulants. Studies have yet to compare the technology to standard intravenous antico...

Jan 21, 2014

The Particulars: Research indicates that approximately one-third of patients with untreated peripheral arterial disease (PAD)-induced intermittent claudication develop critical limb ischemia. Stent th...

Jan 21, 2014

New research is being presented at STS 2014, the 50th Annual Meeting of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, from January 25 to 29 in Orlando.   STS leaders describe some of the mus...

Jan 20, 2014

A couple of months ago, a post called "Everything's my fault: How a surgeon says I'm sorry" appeared on KevinMD. It was by a plastic surgeon who feels that no matter what goes wrong with a patient, su...

Jan 16, 2014

New research is being presented at ISET 2014, the annual  International Symposium on Endovascular Therapy, from January 18 to 22 in Miami Beach. Meeting Highlights Nitinol Stents Maintain QOL ...

Jan 08, 2014

About 16% of all colorectal surgical patients on Medicare are readmitted to the hospital within 30 days. These readmissions last more than 1 week, on average, and cost the healthcare system $300 milli...

Dec 19, 2013

A doctor takes his patients to great new heights—by breaking their legs. National Geographic presents a video on the taboo procedure of limb lengthening. Source: National Geographic...

Dec 16, 2013

I just found out about an article that appeared in Forbes online 7 months ago. It said that a certain hospital system's postoperative infection rate was 5% and then said, "For US hospitals, this is no...

Dec 06, 2013

According to the CDC, the mortality rate associated with Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) increased by 400% between 2000 and 2007, due in part to a stronger germ strain. CDI accounts for approxim...

Dec 02, 2013

About a decade ago, the Joint Section on Disorders of the Spine and Peripheral Nerves of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons (CNS) and the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) releas...

Dec 02, 2013

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgery is a procedure in which electrodes are implanted into specific brain structures and connected to a pacemaker. DBS has been used effectively to treat several neurol...

Dec 02, 2013

Media outlets (Wall Street Journal, Gizmodo) are again reporting that automation is degrading pilots' skills, although this has been known for over 2 years. I blogged about the subject back then as pa...

Nov 25, 2013

In case you missed it, there was a brief romance between thyroid surgeons and robots. Thyroid surgeons, itching to join the crowds migrating to robot-assisted surgery, came up with the idea to use the...

Nov 23, 2013

The Particulars: Research indicates that restenosis is a common drawback of balloon angioplasty for treating infrapopliteal arterial obstructions in patients with critical limb ischemia (CLI). Two maj...

Nov 21, 2013

The Particulars: Data are lacking on the safety and efficacy of using the AngioJet mechanical thrombectomy system (Bayer HealthCare) for treating occluded arteries and veins in hemodialysis patients. ...

Nov 21, 2013

The Particulars: Previous research indicates that multiple sclerosis (MS) is associated with chronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency (CCSVI). Data indicate that 30,000 patients worldwide have under...

Nov 21, 2013

The Particulars: Studies have had varied results on the safety and validity of inferior vena cava (IVC) filter use to prevent iatrogenic pulmonary embolism (PE) that can result from percutaneous endov...

Nov 21, 2013

The Particulars: In hemodialysis patients, early cannulation has been shown to reduce the number of days for which central venous catheters are required, thereby potentially reducing mortality and mor...