Valvular heart disease – where excessively tight or leaky connections between heart chambers gradually wear out the heart – affects up to 10% of older adults and causes more than 120,000 deaths a year worldwide. But three new trials from research institutions, including Rutgers Health, all involving patients from Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital (RWJUH), an RWJBarnabas Health facility, support the use of less invasive treatments that work for more patients with valvular disease.
All three trials demonstrated that catheter-based procedures threaded through blood vessels can match the long-term results of open-heart surgery in relatively healthy patients and offer life-saving options to people too frail for open-heart surgery. Their rapid-fire publications also mark a major victory for Mark J. Russo, professor of surgery and chief of cardiac surgery at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, and chief of cardiothoracic surgery at RWJUH.
“Taking part in clinical trials typically helps all your patients,” said Russo, who made RWJUH among the biggest sites for all three trials. “That’s why I’ve worked so hard over the years to participate as much as possible.” Russo’s successful trial work should help bring more upcoming trials to New Brunswick, ensuring patients with conditions that respond poorly to existing standards of care have the best possible access to experimental procedures that may work better. To read the full story.