Endocarditis
New-Onset AF After TAVR linked To Worse Long-Term Outcomes Compared With Patients With Pre-Existing AF and No AF New-onset AF associated with a higher rate of death, stroke, bleeding and heart failure hospitalizations after TAVR
A registry-based cohort study including 72,660 Medicare patients with and without atrial fibrillation (AF) who underwent non-apical transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) from 2014 to 2016, has shown that, TAVR patients with new-onset AF have the highest rate of all-cause mortality (32%) compared to patients with pre-existing or no AF (23.3% and 12.8%, respectively). New-onset AF was also associated with an increased risk of bleeding, stroke and heart failure (HF) hospitalizations.
Hospitalizations for Stroke Associated With Infective Endocarditis and Opioid Use: National Trends
A recent study published in Circulation Stroke conducted by Omran et al. reported that the US hospitalization rates for stroke associated with infective endocarditis and opioid use were stable for roughly about 2 decades but then sharply increased in 2008, coinciding with the emergence of the opioid epidemic. Continue reading
Early Switch from Intravenous to Oral Antibiotic Therapy for Left-Sided Endocarditis POET trial (Partial Oral Treatment of Endocarditis)
Among patients who had left-sided infective endocarditis (IE) caused by common bacteria, a shift from intravenous (IV) to oral antibiotic treatment was noninferior to continued IV antibiotic treatment, according to the open-label, randomized POET trial (Partial Oral Treatment of Endocarditis; ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT01375257). Contemporary practice guidelines from the US and Europe recommend a 4- to 6-week course of IV antibiotics for patients with a left-sided IE. Data from the POET trial suggest that oral antibiotics may be safely and effectively administered during approximately half of the recommended treatment period, and potentially as outpatient treatment. The study results were presented at the European Society of Cardiology Congress 2018 and published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
