Ultrasound elasticity imaging could allow physicians to noninvasively make the distinction between inflammation and fibrosis in patients with Crohn's disease, and thus enable more appropriate and timely care, according to a study published in the September edition of Gastroenterology.

More than half of women will receive at least one false-positive recall after 10 years of annual mammography screening, according to a study published Oct. 18 in the Annals of Internal Medicine. The findings may fan the flames of the screening debate as an accompanying editorial suggested that the results support screening intervals of two years or more. However, educating women about the incidence of false positives may reduce anxiety, according to the lead author.

Much has changed in Interventional Cardiology since I completed my fellowship in 2002. Back then most of us were primarily coronary interventionalists. Drug-eluting stents (DES) were newly approved, and the idea of 60- to 90-minute door-to-balloon times was still a distant goal. Peripheral interventions were only beginning to interest us, and only busy cath labs might have had a single person performing valvuloplasty and early ASD [atrial septal defect] closure.

When cath lab directors began reviewing quarterly reports from the ACC-NCDR CathPCI Registry earlier this year, they might have been surprised to find a new benchmark: the ranking of PCI procedures as appropriate, inappropriate, or uncertain.

The FDA has issued draft guidance that would lower the risk classification for external pacemaker pulse generators from Class III to Class II.

GE Healthcare has formed a manufacturing agreement with Advanced Accelerator Applications, a pharmaceutical company based in Milan, Italy, and focused on molecular nuclear medicine.

The use of surgery to treat early-stage laryngeal cancer is increasing in the U.S., and chemotherapy in combination with radiotherapy is being used increasingly to treat patients in an advanced stage of the disease, according to a report published in the October issue of the Archives of Otoloaryngology Head & Neck Surgery.

Laboratory generation of billions of heart cells edged out other promising technological innovations this yearsuch as improvements in biofuel production and IBMs supercomputer, Watsonas the healthcare entry took top honors in the Wall Street Journals 2011 Technology Innovation Awards.