Texas Heart Institute—June 17, 2022 – The Texas Heart Institute Journal presented its inaugural James T. Willerson, MD, Editor’s Choice Award on Friday, June 17 to honor its former Editor-in-Chief and THI President Emeritus who, until his passing in the fall of 2020, remained committed to providing physicians and healthcare professionals with information related to all aspects of treating patients who have cardiovascular disease. Dr. Willerson’s standards for excellence in research and scientific publishing were unsurpassed, and today the Journal’s readership continues to grow because of the strong foundation he and his predecessors built.

The Editor’s Choice Awards are made possible by the Texas Heart Institute Board of Trustees and a gift from Morton Cohn.  The winning articles exemplify the Journal’s intended purpose to provide physicians and healthcare professionals with quality and timely information related to the treatment of patients with some of the most complex cardiovascular conditions.

“The Texas Heart Institute Journal has a long and storied history of providing clinically meaningful contributions to the medical literature.  The Journal also encourages new authors to submit original work and gain experience with the medical publication process,” stated THI President and CEO Joseph G. Rogers, MD.

 

The 2021 winning papers are:

Continuous-Flow Left Ventricular Assist Device Support in Patients with Ischemic Versus Nonischemic Cardiomyopathy
Chou BP, Critsinelis A, Lamba HK, Long G, Civitello AB, Delgado RM, Chatterjee S.

Among cardiomyopathy patients supported by a continuous-flow LVAD, ischemic versus nonischemic cardiomyopathy appeared to have little relationship to outcomes save that ischemic cardiomyopathy was associated with more frequent gastrointestinal bleeding.

 

“Simple” Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement With Conscious Sedation: Safety and Effectiveness in Real-World Practice
Postalian A, Strickman NE, Costello BT, Dougherty KG, Krajcer Z.

A fast-track method of selecting and treating patients who require transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) produced outcomes comparable to those of standard TAVR performed at other centers.

 

Ultrafast Computation of Left Ventricular Ejection Fraction by Using Temporal Intensity Variation in Cine Cardiac Magnetic Resonance
Pednekar AS, Cheong BYC, Muthupillai R.

A new algorithm for acquiring and processing cardiac magnetic resonance with minimal user interaction method produced comparable clinical results to those of standard, manual processing.