Shared decision-making for older adults with cardiovascular disease

Shared decision‐making is appropriate for clinical decisions involving multiple reasonable options, which occur frequently in the cardiovascular care of older adults. The process includes the communication of relevant factual information between the patient and the clinician, elicitation of patient preferences, and a mutual agreement on the best course of action to meet the patient's personal goals. For older adults, there are common challenges and considerations with regard to shared decision‐making, some of which (eg, cognitive impairment) may be biologically linked to cardiovascular disease. There are tools designed to facilitate the shared decision‐making process, known as decision aids, which are broadly effective although have shortcomings when applied to older adults. Novel approaches in clinical research and health systems changes will go some way toward improving shared decision‐making for older adults, but the greatest scope for improvement may be within the grass roots areas of communication skills, interdisciplinary teamwork, and simply asking our patients what matters most.

What to Expect From the Evolving Field of Geriatric Cardiology

The population of older adults is expanding rapidly, and aging predisposes to cardiovascular disease. The principle of patient-centered care must respond to the preponderance of cardiac disease that now occurs in combination with the complexities of old age. Geriatric cardiology melds cardiovascular perspectives with multimorbidity, polypharmacy, frailty, cognitive decline, and other clinical, social, financial, and psychological dimensions of aging. Although some assume that a cardiologist may instinctively cultivate some of these skills over the course of a career, we assert that the volume and complexity of older cardiovascular patients in contemporary practice warrants a more direct approach to achieve suitable training and a more reliable process of care. We present a rationale and vision for geriatric cardiology as a melding of primary cardiovascular and geriatrics skills, thereby infusing cardiology practice with expanded proficiencies in diagnosis, risks, care coordination, communications, end-of-life, and other competences required to best manage older cardiovascular patients.

Transesophageal echocardiographic Doppler findings in patients with penetrating aortic ulcers

Penetrating aortic ulcers and intramural hematomas cannot always be differentiated by transesophageal echocardiography. We suggest that color and pulsed-wave Doppler flow can be used for identifying penetrating aortic ulcers.

Laparoscopic cholecystectomy in the heart transplant candidate with acute cholecystitis

We report the first successful laparoscopic cholecystectomy for treatment of acute cholecystitis in a heart transplant candidate with end-stage heart disease. Eight successful cases of conventional cholecystectomy in heart transplant candidates have been reported, but convalescence after the conventional procedure is prolonged, and morbidity often interferes with a timely heart transplantation. Laparoscopic cholecystectomy is a less-invasive method for treatment of symptomatic cholelithiasis and cholecystitis and may be better tolerated in this patient population. Although further study is needed, we believe laparoscopic cholecystectomy will have applications in patients with end-stage heart disease.

Differential prostacyclin production by human umbilical vasculature

Using the avidin-biotin immunohistochemical technique with rabbit antihuman 6-keto-prostaglandin (PG)-F1 alpha (6KPGF), we studied the distribution of the stable prostacyclin metabolite, 6KPGF, in 14 formaldehyde-fixed human umbilical cords. All umbilical veins demonstrated intense endothelial cell staining. None of the arteries stained. To corroborate the immunohistochemical findings, three fresh umbilical cords were dissected to separate arteries from veins and then were incubated in oxygenated tissue baths containing Ringer's lactate (37 degrees C) for 30 minutes. Cumulative 6KPGF production as measured by radioimmunoassay of tissue effluents was markedly different between arteries and veins with the umbilical vein producing the largest quantity of 6KPGF. Thus, immunohistochemistry and ex vivo capacitance studies suggest that there is a differential distribution of 6KPGF in human umbilical arteries and veins.

Mitral valve replacement early after myocardial infarction: attendant high risk of left ventricular rupture

Between 1969 and 1983, 608 patients underwent mitral valve replacement surgery at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. Perioperative rupture of the left ventricular myocardium complicated seven operations (1.2%), five of them in the 247 patients with concomitant ischemic heart disease. Six ruptures were fatal. Relative incidences of seven previously hypothesized predisposing factors were determined for patients with and without myocardial rupture. In addition, because of the apparent frequency of association with ischemic heart disease and because all ruptures were posterior or posterolateral, patients were also categorized by prior history of posterior myocardial infarction: 177 patients had none, whereas 49 patients had a remote and 21 patients a recent (less than or equal to 1 month) posterior wall infarct. Four ruptures (accounting for 57% of all ruptures) occurred in the 21 patients (19% incidence) with a recent posterior infarct, compared with only three ruptures in the 587 patients (0.5%) without a recent posterior wall infarct (p = 0.000). None of the factors of age, sex, valve pathology, etiology of valve lesion, concomitant coronary disease, valve substitute or intraoperative myocardial preservation were associated with perioperative rupture. These data establish a low overall incidence of ventricular rupture after mitral valve replacement, high fatality and possible etiologic association with recent posterior wall infarction.

Immunohistochemical localization of 6-keto-PGF1-alpha in canine coronary vasculature

The localization of the prostacyclin metabolite, 6-keto-PGF1-alpha, in canine coronary vasculature was accomplished using immunohistochemical techniques (avidin-biotin method of immunoperoxidase staining). Six-keto-PGF1-alpha was localized to the intimal endothelial cell layer of epicardial and intramyocardial arteries and veins. No specific staining was seen in the the media or adventitia of canine coronary vasculature, or in capillaries, or myocardial fibers. To our knowledge these studies represent the first immunohistochemical demonstration of the endothelial cell localization of the prostacyclin metabolite, 6-keto-PGF1-alpha. The described technique allows the cellular localization of prostaglandin metabolites in histologic sections.