Extended 5-Year Follow-up of the PFO Closure Trial In initial report Gore REDUCE trial patent foramen ovale closure, with a median follow-up 3.2 years, 18 patients had stroke recur...

We describe a rare case of acute myocardial infarction secondary to paradoxical embolism complicating acute pulmonary embolism. A 44-year-old woman presented to the emergency department with chest pain. The physical examination was unremarkable except for oxygen saturation of 75%, and the electrocardiogram showed ST-segment elevation in the inferior leads. Urgent coronary angiography showed a d...

Paradoxical embolism is defined as venous thrombosis causing systemic embolization through a right-to-left shunt. We, herein, report a case of bilateral total knee arthroplasty and developed paradoxical embolism caused by patent foramen ovale. A sixty-two-year-old female had a simultaneous, total knee arthroplasty for primary osteo-arthritis. A pulmonary emboli was suspected on the thirteenth p...

Migraine is a neurological disorder characterized by an increased individual susceptibility to respond to certain triggers by a propagating wave of neuronal depolarization that culminates in typical migraine headaches. Patients with a patent foramen ovale or any kind of right-to-left shunt are more likely to have migraine; and patients with migraine with aura are more likely to have a patent fo...

BACKGROUND Patent foramen ovale as a possible stroke risk factor can be diagnosed with transcranial Doppler sonography (TCD) by detecting intravenous contrast medium crossing from the right to the left atrium. The present study evaluates the reliability of this method. SUMMARY OF REPORT We performed TCD and transesophageal echocardiography simultaneously in 50 patients using galactose microbu...

R ECENTLY two cases of pulmonary infarction were encountered which showed atypical clinical manifestations. At autopsy, in each instance a thrombus was found straddling a patent foramen ovale, suggesting a functional shunt during life. It is the purpose of this paper to describe the associated syndrome. Although some 48 instances of a clot caught in a patent foramen ovale have been described si...

OBJECTIVE Percutaneous transcatheter occlusion has benefited thousands of patients suffering from patent foramen ovale and atrial septal defect. However, no general agreement has been reached on the superiority among occluders. Thus, a meta-analysis between the two most commonly adopted types of occluders was conducted. METHODS The literature review has identified relevant studies up to May, ...

BACKGROUND The options for secondary prevention of cryptogenic embolism in patients with patent foramen ovale are administration of antithrombotic medications or percutaneous closure of the patent foramen ovale. We investigated whether closure is superior to medical therapy. METHODS We performed a multicenter, superiority trial in 29 centers in Europe, Canada, Brazil, and Australia in which t...

BACKGROUND Noninvasive positive pressure ventilation is frequently prescribed to obese patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome and obesity hypoventilation syndrome. However, mechanical ventilation with a positive end-expiratory pressure can induce or worsen a right-to-left shunt through a patent foramen ovale associated with systemic hypoxemia. Thus, in obese patients treated with noninv...

OBJECTIVE To describe morphological features of the interatrial septum in normal fetuses, especially foramen ovale (FO) and septum primum (SP), in order to compare septum primum excursion with foramen ovale diameter. METHODS Septum primum excursion (SPE) toward the left atrium (LA) and foramen ovale diameter (FOD) were measured in the hearts of ten formaldehyde-fixed human fetuses ranging fro...