ESC: Leadless Pacemaker Results Promising at 6 Months | Medpage Today

Among patients who required single-chamber ventricular pacing and who were implanted with the device, 270 of 300 in the primary cohort achieved an acceptable pacing threshold (95% CI 86.0-93.2, P=0.007) and 280 (93.3%) achieved an acceptable safety endpoint (95% CI 89.9-95.9, P=0.001), reported Vivek Reddy, MD, of Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, and colleagues.

Overall, 504 out of 526 (95.8%) patients had the devices implanted successfully, Reddy reported at a press briefing at the European Society of Cardiology. The study results were published simultaneously in the New England Journal of Medicine.

“The leadless cardiac pacemaker met prespecified pacing and sensing requirements in the large majority of patients,” Reddy’s group wrote. “Device-related serious adverse events occurred in approximately 1 in 15 patients.”

The device does, however, have a troubled history: an observational post-marketing study in Europe was halted in 2014 after reports of six perforations including two that resulted in death. At the time, the device maker said they problems were related to operator inexperience as well as patient selection. The trial was stopped again earlier this year — again due to perforations — but device-maker St. Jude said it restarted the trial in early summer.

Among patients who required single-chamber ventricular pacing and who were implanted with the device, 270 of 300 in the primary cohort achieved an acceptable pacing threshold (95% CI 86.0-93.2, P=0.007) and 280 (93.3%) achieved an acceptable safety endpoint (95% CI 89.9-95.9, P=0.001), reported Vivek Reddy, MD, of Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, and colleagues.

Overall, 504 out of 526 (95.8%) patients had the devices implanted successfully, Reddy reported at a press briefing at the European Society of Cardiology. The study results were published simultaneously in the New England Journal of Medicine.

LONDON — A leadless pacemaker implanted transfemorally in the heart’s right ventricle appeared to function well in the majority of patients over its first 6 months of use, researchers reported here.

Curated from ESC: Leadless Pacemaker Results Promising at 6 Months | Medpage Today

 Drink #Water Before Meals to Lose Weight?

After being tracked for 12 weeks, with a phone consultation after 2 weeks, the water-before-meals group lost an average of 2.87 pounds more than those who just imagined being full.  People who loaded up on water before all three main meals a day lost an average of 9.48 pounds. Doing that just once a day, or not at all, resulted in an average loss of 1.76 pounds.

“The beauty of these findings is in the simplicity. Just drinking a pint of water, three times a day, before your main meals may help reduce your weight,” says Dr. Helen Parretti, one of the study authors, in a statement. “When combined with brief instructions on how to increase your amount of physical activity and [get] on a healthy diet, this seems to help people to achieve some extra #weight loss — at a moderate and healthy rate. It’s something that doesn’t take much work to integrate into our busy everyday lives.”

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After being tracked for 12 weeks, with a phone consultation after 2 weeks, the water-before-meals group lost an average of 2.87 pounds more than those who just imagined being full.

Then the researchers randomly split the participants into two groups. They asked one group of 41 volunteers to drink 500 milliliters (about 16 ounces) of water half an hour before meals. Sparkling water, carbonated drinks, or sweetened drinks were not allowed.

Curated from Drink Water Before Meals to Lose Weight?