Sorry this took most of the week to get out. (There was a good reason.) Better late than never I suppose. On Day 3 of the 2013 American College of Cardiology meeting, I woke up well rested and inspired to squeeze in as much learning as possible. The first order of business was putting the […]
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Will writing help with the sadness?
I grew up in Connecticut. It was in a town just like Newtown. It was safe and it was quiet. I am a father and a grandfather. My life is surrounded with children. This weekend has been tough. You try to read or write something, but the mind wanders. Then you feel sadness. The more […]
As I plodded along the cyclcocross track today a heckler shouted: “Hey Mandrola….blog about this.” By ‘this,’ I can only assume he meant how cool our sport is. He surely wasn’t heckling a doctor about a lackluster performance. Alright then. Mr. Heckler said blog on. —- A few weeks ago I received a tweet asking […]
The late-morning sessions addressed the possible mechanism(s) of AF. Many ask what causes AF. The assumption holds that if we can ablate AF, we must know what causes it. This would not be true. One line of thinking holds that disorganized electrical conduction throughout the atria plays an important role–not just focal drivers and initiators […]
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An antidote…
Without trying very hard you can read about all that gives doctors the blues. CNNMoney recently reported that many docs are actually going broke. It’s true, the take-the-fun-out-of-medicine people push harder all the time. But worry not, I am not going to drone on about negative things. I’m not even going to list one. (Think […]
As the calendar arbitrarily marks the New Year, it’s normal for those who seek better health to make promises. Good ones like: I will exercise more. I will exercise smarter. Or, for many of the yet to be turned: I will start exercising. This is because most everyone understands the benefits of exercise. Specifically, it’s […]
I learned a lot from putting together an abstract for a national heart meeting. More than just learning how to e-submit, e-upload and e-print a large poster; More than what t-tests and chi-squares measure; More than learning that females respond differently to AF ablation; And surely more than which coffee shop offers the best work […]
Doctors that treat atrial fibrillation (AF) are getting close to celebrating the one-year anniversary of having a substitute for warfarin. As an early adopter of the novel new blood-thinner, I would like to share some (almost) one year-old observations on dabigatran (Pradaxa). First, the science behind dabigatran is stellar. The landmark RE-LY trial studied 18,000 […]
It may seem a little formal to say this, but I would like to start by stating my goals for today’s post: Introduce the concept of the athletic heart; Touch upon the notion of sudden death of the athlete; Explain what an ECG really is, and how it may help diagnose heart disease; Review a […]
I recently came across a very important blog post on the use of the novel new blood-thinner, dabigatran (Pradaxa). Fellow Kentucky cardiologist, and frequent TheHeart.org contributor, Dr. Melissa Walton-Shirley wrote this very detailed case presentation involving a cantankerous non-compliant rural patient with AF (atrial fibrillation) that sustained a stroke while “taking†dabigatran. Dr. Walton-Shirley details […]
The unrelenting epidemic of inactivity and excessive eating wreaks havoc on more than just the heart and blood vessels. Lugging around extra weight also breaks down the joints and back. For evidence, look no further than the waiting room of any orthopedist; the people waiting for joint replacements look the same as those waiting to […]