heart disease tagged posts

Cleveland Clinic researchers have identified a new pathway that contributes to cardiovascular disease associated with high levels of niacin, a common B vitamin previously recommended to lower cholesterol.

The team, led by Stanley Hazen, M.D., Ph.D., discovered a link between 4PY, a breakdown product from excess niacin, and heart disease. Higher circulating levels of 4PY were strongly associated with development of heart attack, stroke and other adverse cardiac events in large-scale clinical studies. The researchers also showed in preclinical studies that 4PY directly triggers vascular inflammation which damages blood vessels and can lead to atherosclerosis over time.

The study, published in Nature Medicine, also details genetic links between 4PY and vascular inflammation...

It could be the shopping trip that saves your life: supermarket trolleys are helping to diagnose atrial fibrillation which can then be treated to prevent disabling or fatal strokes. The research is presented today at ACNAP 2023, a scientific congress of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC).

“This study shows the potential of taking health checks to the masses without disrupting daily routines,” said study author Professor Ian Jones of Liverpool John Moores University, UK. “Over the course of two months, we identified 39 patients who were unaware that they had atrial fibrillation...

Wataru Kimura and colleagues at the RIKEN Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research (BDR) in Japan have discovered how the hearts of newborn marsupials retain the ability to regenerate for several weeks. Using this knowledge, the team was able to repair mouse hearts that were damaged a week after birth. The findings, published in the journal Circulation, are expected to contribute to the development of regenerative heart medicines.

Heart disease is a leading cause of human death and is associated with numerous other secondary illnesses. For humans and other mammals, damaged heart muscle—such as occurs after a heart attack—cannot be naturally repaired because matured heart-muscle cells do not regenerate...