This year’s scientific sessions of the American Heart Association (AHA) have been disruptive to common dogma. The Presidential Address was preceded by select songs from the Broadway musical, Hamilton. Not surprising, one of the song’s lyrics, “I want to be in the room where it happens,” caught my attention. We all want to be where … Read more
Research continues to mount showing that stress affects our health and well-being. The various daily experiences we face that lead to stress set off a cascade of physiological responses that, when experienced over a lifetime, can lead to diabetes, hypertension, and eventually heart attack and stroke. The effects of stress experienced over a lifetime are … Read more
Approximately 30-40% of AHA Scientific session attendees are from outside of the United States. Taking a couple (or more!) of flights, landing in a new city after a 23-hour trip from across the Atlantic and functioning at optimum levels during a meeting of such magnitude may well be a formidable task, particularly when it’s a … Read more
The ISCHEMIA trial definitely caused quite a chatter, and congratulations to the authors on a thought provoking and interesting study. I’m fascinated and can’t wait to do a deep dive on my own time. BUT, that’s for stable ischemic heart disease. There’s a time and a place for that, but that place is certainly not … Read more
#AHA19 was an amazing meeting in all aspects!! I totally enjoyed every moment and definitely recommend all fellows and early career cardiologists to attend and participate in this important meeting. I will share my experience and highlight important sessions fellows and early career colleagues should not miss. The fellow-in-training (FIT) and Early Career Lounge The … Read more
I’ve always been invested in lived narratives of others. Whether through a PhotoVoice project of patients with hypertension in Baltimore or people I meet in passing, I’ve never taken the presentation of a person or their behaviors at face value. As in my chosen field of inquiry—studying mechanisms underlying racial/ethnic disparities—each person I encounter presents … Read more
We are doing a pretty poor job of getting our patients with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction (HFrEF) on the appropriate guideline-directed medical therapies (GDMT). It is the talk of the town (and by town, I mean Twitter- and if you are not following Gregg Fonarow, MD @gcfmd on there, you need to because … Read more
I have always been fascinated by the advances in heart failure specially with the mechanical circulatory support (MSC) devices. Cardiogenic shock is no longer simply cardiogenic shock but a syndrome with a wide array of different presentations as demonstrated by the SCAI Expert Consensus on the Classifications of Cardiogenic Shock (Figure 1) or better yet … Read more
You would be hard-pressed to find anyone who would counter the argument that education in Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) is very important; you would also struggle to find anyone in the healthcare field who would not counter you if you said you said you found the experience of becoming certified and re-certified exhilarating or “fun.” Every … Read more
What is digital health? Digital health is the application of digital technology using mobile applications or wearable sensors for the betterment of health.1 This offers a distinct pathway for advancing healthcare as compared to medical devices and drugs. Digital health is uniquely positioned to tackle multiple unmet needs in healthcare such as improving medication adherence, … Read more