BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES A higher neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR) has been associated with poor clinical outcomes in various cardiac diseases. However, the clinical availability of NLR in patients with ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) undergoing primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) has not been known. We evaluated the availability of NLR to predict clinical outcomes ...

There is increasing interest in childhood maltreatment as a potent stimulus that may alter trajectories of brain development, induce epigenetic modifications and enhance risk for medical and psychiatric disorders. Although a number of useful scales exist for retrospective assessment of abuse and neglect they have significant limitations. Moreover, they fail to provide detailed information on ti...

Conventional biomarker discovery focuses mostly on the identification of single markers and thus often has limited success in disease diagnosis and prognosis. This study proposes a method to identify an optimized protein biomarker panel based on MS studies for predicting the risk of major adverse cardiac events (MACE) in patients. Since the simplicity and concision requirement for the developme...

BACKGROUND The aim of this study was to observe the effects of genetic polymorphism of CYP2C19 on inhibitory effects of ticagrelor (Tic) and clopidogrel (Clo) towards post-percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) platelet aggregation (IPA) and major cardiovascular events (MACE) in patients with acute coronary syndromes (ACS). MATERIAL AND METHODS From August 2013 to March 2014, 166 patients wit...

OBJECTIVES The major aim of this study is to test the hypothesis that stress cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) imaging can provide robust prognostic value in women presenting with suspected ischemia, to the same extent as in men. BACKGROUND Compelling evidence indicates that women with coronary artery disease (CAD) experience worse outcomes than men owing to a lack of early diagnosis and manag...

Background: Our study investigated the association between circulating levels of lipoprotein (a) [Lp(a)] and the incidence of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE). Materials and Methods: Primary percutaneous coronary intervention was conducted in 175 Chinese patients diagnosed with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) and were followed prospectively for one year. Based on th...

AIM to assess heart rate variability (HRV) measurements using pulse photoplethysmograph (PPG) in predicting major adverse cardiac event (MACE) in acute coronary syndrome (ACS) patients. METHODS a prospective cohort study was conducted among hospitalized ACS patients. Heart rate variability as predictor was measured by PPG within 48 hours after admission and the incidence of MACE as outcome wa...

BACKGROUND Single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) is an important prognostic tool in evaluating coronary artery disease (CAD), with a high negative predictive value (NPV) for the occurrence of major adverse cardiac events (MACE). The prognostic value of SPECT is disputed in women, patients with atrial fibrillation (AF), diabetes, left bundle branch block (LBBB) and renal impairment....

BACKGROUND Brain-type natriuretic peptide (BNP) and the amino-terminal fragment of its prohormone (NT-proBNP) are known predictors of cardiovascular outcomes in patients with coronary heart disease; however, the relative prognostic value of these 2 biomarkers for secondary events remains unclear. METHODS AND RESULTS In 983 participants with stable coronary heart disease, we evaluated the asso...

BACKGROUND Distal coronary flow velocity reserve (CVR) is significantly improved after a successful balloon angioplasty (PTCA). Furthermore, a postinterventional CVR >2.5 and a percent diameter stenosis (%DS) </=35% are predictive for a low incidence of major adverse cardiac events (MACE) at 6 months of 16%. Similar results are lacking for coronary stenting. METHODS AND RESULTS In 150 patient...