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How To Confirm The Causes Of Iron Deficiency Anemia In Young Women
Iron-deficiency anaemia (IDA) is commonly seen in women aged under 50 years. The diagnostic workflow in young women affected by IDA is not clearly established. The British Society of Gastroenterology recommends gastroscopy only in IDA women younger than 45 years presenting with gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms. However, symptoms are often mild and aspecific in IDA women and the gastroscopy is an invasive procedure associated with a high number of refusals. In a previous work on IDA premenopausal women, gastroscopy was performed in all patients, later deemed unnecessary in almost 30% of the studied women because these were affected only by menorrhagia.

Advance In Detecting Melamine-adulterated Food
Researchers in Indiana are reporting an advance toward faster, more sensitive tests for detecting melamine, the substance that killed at least 6 children and sickened 300,000 children in China who drank milk and infant formula adulterated with the substance. The improved tests may ease global concerns about food safety, the researchers say. Their report is scheduled for the May 27 issue of ACS" Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, a bi-weekly publication.
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Taxing Fatty Foods Or Health Insurers Gains Traction
Lawmakers are considering two new taxes to help pay for a health care overhaul: a tax on fatty foods and taxing insurers on so-called Cadillac plans. Both proposals were scrutinized in news articles.
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Devax Receives IDE Approval To Commence DIVERGE II

Devax, Inc. announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has conditionally approved an Investigational Device Exemption ("IDE") for its AXXESS™ Biolimus A9® Eluting Bifurcation Stent System (AXXESS System), allowing the company to initiate a pivotal clinical trial (DIVERGE II) of the device in the United States. The DIVERGE II study is a multicenter, blinded, controlled, randomized trial comparing the treatment of bifurcation lesions with the AXXESS stent to standard techniques with conventional stents. The Principal Investigator is Jeffrey Moses, M.D., Professor of Medicine and Director of the Center for Intravascular Therapy at Columbia University Medical Center in New York. Bifurcation lesions occur in approximately 20% of patients that are treated for ischemic heart disease with coronary angioplasty and stenting. Recent large scale clinical studies, such as SYNTAX and LEADERS, have shown that lesions located at vessel bifurcations increase the frequency of major adverse cardiac events by as much as 40% compared to lesions in straight vessel segments. Currently, there is no stent with an FDA approved indication for use in bifurcation lesions. Devax has implanted over 430 AXXESS stents in two clinical studies conducted outside the United States. The second of these studies, DIVERGE I, enrolled 302 patients at 16 clinical centers in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. The 9 month follow up for these patients was presented last October at the Transcatheter Therapeutics conference in Washington, D.C. The data, published in the March 23, 2009 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, show high rates of clinical success and low rates of restenosis compared to other studies of bifurcations. Discussing the significance of the study, Professor Moses said, "DIVERGE II will be a landmark study because there are many novel aspects to the trial. The AXXESS stent is the first drug eluting stent dedicated solely to bifurcation lesions. We see these types of lesions frequently in daily practice, and they are difficult to treat with conventional stents and techniques. Also, this study is the first randomized study to compare a lesion-specific drug eluting stent to a standard device in a complex vessel anatomy." "This is the first IDE approval of a drug eluting stent specifically designed for use in coronary bifurcations," said Jeff Thiel, President and CEO. "We have focused our attention on being the first to market in the United States with a dedicated DES, and this is an important step toward that goal." The Devax AXXESS System technology is a proprietary self-expanding Nitinol stent specifically designed for the treatment of coronary and vascular bifurcation lesions. The conical shape of the stent is designed to conform to the bifurcation anatomy and provide full access to both branches for additional interventional procedures. Devax, Inc., a private emerging medical device company located in Irvine, California, is engaged in the development of solutions for the treatment of atherosclerotic disease in coronary arteries. Devax, Inc.


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