TriReme Medical, Inc. Receives FDA 510 K Clearance For Chocolate PTA Balloon Catheter
TriReme Medical, Inc. ("TriReme"), a leading developer of innovative devices for the treatment of complex vascular disease, announced that it has received 510(K) clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to market its Chocolate PTA balloon catheter ("Chocolate") for the treatment of occluded peripheral arteries. Chocolate was developed in collaboration with TriReme's subsidiary, Quattro Vascular Pte Ltd in Singapore. Chocolate's novel design incorporates a constraining structure over a semi-compliant balloon to facilitate the formation of small modules ("pillows").
No Increased Risk Of Cardiac Arrest By Participating In Marathons, Half-Marathons
Participation in marathon and half-marathon races is at an all-time high, but numerous reports of race-related cardiac arrests have called the safety of this activity into question. A new study finds that participating in these races actually is associated with a relatively low risk of cardiac arrest, compared to other forms of athletics. An analysis of 10 years of data, appearing in the New England Journal of Medicine, reveals that most of those experiencing cardiac arrest during marathons and half-marathons had undiagnosed, pre-existing cardiac abnormalities.
MRI Scans Better For Suspected Heart Disease Patients
In recent years, imaging techniques such as the most commonly used single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), have gradually replaced exercise treadmill tests for diagnosing heart disease. Now a five-year trial of over 750 heart disease patients conducted by the University of Leeds in the UK suggests that a more modern scanning method based on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is better for diagnosing coronary heart disease than SPECT and should be more widely adopted. The findings could change the way patients with suspected heart disease are tested, not least because the MRI approach, called multiparametric cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR), does not involve invasive procedures or ionizing radiation.