2021年 · 第01卷第03期

Percutaneous endomyocardial biopsy (EMB) is a technique that biopsy samples are obtained using bioptome through peripheral blood vessel. This technique has been used and refined more than 50 years in clinical application. Now EMB has become an important diagnostic tool in the diagnosis of myocarditis and cardiomyopathy. Department of cardiology, Peking Union Medical College Hospital (PUMCH) has performed more than 500 cases of EMB and accumulated abundant practical experience. The clinical practice guideline of percutaneous EMB in PUMCH was also established, including indications, contradictions, operation key points, sample handling and processing, post-procedure monitoring, and treatment strategy for potential complications, etc. Due to the limitation of EMB, cardiologists should collaborate with experts in echocardiography, cardiac magnetic resonance and cardiac pathology to avoid missed diagnosis and misdiagnosis. Cardiologists should pay more attention to the value of EMB and actively perform EMB to improve the diagnosis level for myocarditis and cardiomyopathy in China.

Objective: Observational studies indicate that insomnia may increase the risk of developing and/or dying from cardiovascular diseases, especially coronary artery disease (CAD). Our purpose is to explore the underlying causal relationship between genetic variants susceptible to insomnia and the risk of CAD by Mendelian randomization analysis. Methods: The study was conducted using publicly available statistical data on genetic variants identified from a genome-wide association meta-analysis of insomnia (n = 113,006 individuals) and a genome-wide association meta-analysis of CAD (n = 184,305 individuals), which consisted of both cases and non-cases. The genetic association between variants and CAD was assessed by the variants’ association with insomnia, and estimations were integrated by an inverse-variance weighted meta-analysis. Results: Among the Mendelian randomized analytical sample, 8 variants were associated with insomnia complaints and CAD. And there was no pleiotropic association with the latent confounders. In addition, in the inverse-variance weighted meta-analysis (the estimations combined from the 8 variants), the odds ratio was 1.15 (95% CI: 1.05-1.25; P= 0.002) for CAD, and in the weighted method analysis, the odds ratio was 1.14 (95% CI: 1.03-1.27; P= 0.015) for CAD. Conclusions: All of the data indicated that some valuable variants might involve in the development of CAD by leading the insomnia. Therefore, insomnia might be a causal factor for CAD, and improving the quality of sleep might be a new way for populations with insomnia to prevent CAD.

Objective: Older patients with comorbidity, such as coronary heart disease (CHD) and malignant gastrointestinal tumors, are at a high risk of bleeding events. However, risk prediction models based on risk factor assessment remain unclear. This study aimed to establish an individualized bleeding risk assessment system based on the analysis of 10-year inpatient clinical big data. Methods: Total clinical data of 56,819 patients with CHD and 25,988 patients with malignant digestive tract tumors (admitted from January 2008 to December 2017) were retrospectively collected at the First and Second Medical Centers of Chinese People’s Liberation Army General Hospital. Among them, 1307 patients with CHD and malignant digestive tract tumors were screened as the derivation cohort. The dependent variable was the occurrence of major clinical bleeding events. Baseline statistics and hypothesis tests of differences were performed for independent variables according to the occurrence of bleeding. Decision Tree, eXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), logistic regression, and random forest models were used for comparison. The accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, and area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC-ROC) were applied as the criteria for evaluating and verifying model performance. To evaluate this developed model, another cohort comprising 454 patients (admitted from January 2018 to December 2019) was prospectively enrolled as the validation cohort based on the same inclusion and exclusion criteria. Results: Among the 64 variables with <50% missing values, the recursive feature elimination method with a random forest model was used to screen the selected variables. The highest accuracy was obtained following the selection of 10 scalars, and the final model was constructed accordingly. XGBoost demonstrated the best performance comprehensively. The AUC-ROC of this model was 0.981, with an accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of 0.939, 0.950, and 0.927, respectively. In the validation cohort, the AUC-ROC, accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of the XGBoost model were 0.702, 0.718, 0.636, and 0.725, respectively. The rate of major bleeding events has a positive correlation with the bleeding risk score quintiles. To allow for convenient clinical application, a smartphone application was developed for easy access and calculation (http://fir.master-wx.com/sghr). Conclusion: We successfully established a risk model and score for predicting bleeding events in older patients with comorbidity, such as CHD and gastrointestinal cancer.

Hypertension significantly increases the risk of embolic stroke and systemic embolism in patients with atrial fibrillation, while statin therapy can improve long-term outcomes in hypertensive patients at high risk. However, it is still unclear whether patients with both hypertension and atrial fibrillation can benefit from intensive management of blood pressure and cholesterol. IMPRESSION is a 3-year prospective, randomized, open-label, blinded-endpoint investigation. A total of 1200 hypertensive patients with atrial fibrillation from about 40 clinical centers nationwide will be included upon confirming the presence of both hypertension and atrial fibrillation and will be randomly assigned to groups for intensive or standard management of blood pressure and cholesterol. Patients in all groups will have office and home blood pressure measured by the end of the first month and every 3 months thereafter. The effects of blood pressure and cholesterol management strategies in patients with hypertension and atrial fibrillation on fatal and non-fatal stroke, acute myocardial infarction, and cardiovascular death at 3 years will be assessed. The IMPRESSION study protocol has received approval from the Ethics Committee of Ruijin Hospital, Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine. The procedures set out in this protocol are in accordance with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki and Good Clinical Practice guidelines. The results will be published following the CONSORT statement in a peer-reviewed scientific journal (Trial registration number: NCT04111419).

Intravenous anticoagulant therapy is critical to prevent ischemic recurrences and complications without increasing the risk of bleeding in patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) undergoing primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PPCI). It includes the indirect thrombin inhibitor heparins and the direct thrombin inhibitor bivalirudin. However, the ideal anticoagulant for patients undergoing PPCI remains controversial. In this review, we provide an overview of currently available anticoagulant therapies used in STEMI patients undergoing PPCI, including describing the rationale for their use, pivotal clinical trial data, and treatment recommendations of guidelines, providing much-needed clarity to guide the selection of the safest and most effective anticoagulant regimens for PPCI.

Long QT syndrome is an inherited arrhythmia characterized by a prolonged QT interval and increased risk of life-threatening cardiac events, including arrhythmogenic syncope, seizures, and sudden cardiac death with a structurally normal heart. Since its first description in the 1950s, extensive researches allowed a better understanding of the cause and mechanisms of this disease, which improved our ability of early diagnosis, risk stratification, and precise therapy of these patients. This article provides an updated review of the clinical and molecular profiles of this potentially lethal inherited disorder and summarizes current knowledge regarding diagnosis, risk stratification, and therapy.