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It is well established that a patient's partner can be deeply affected by the traumatizing nature of the patient's illness. Yet, no study to date has focused on post-traumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) among partners of patients coping with an acute coronary syndrome (ACS). The current study's main aims were to address this gap and to evaluate cardiac disease-induced (CDI) PTSS prevalence in partners of patients who experienced ACS. Patients who experienced ACS and their partners were interviewed by telephone 2 to 6 months after patients' hospitalization. All patients and partners were screened for CDI-PTSS. Demographic and medical variables as well as partners' level of exposure to the cardiac event were assessed. Prevalence of CDI-PTSS was higher among partners than among patients. Partners' number of CDI-PTSS was not significantly associated with patients' number of CDI-PTSS or with any of the other explanatory factors measured, except for education level. The preliminary results that arose from the current study point to the vast number of individuals who must act as caregivers for their ill partners while having to cope with their own PTSS. Much effort should be channelled into integrating partners into cardiac recovery programmes. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Background Anticoagulation with heparin is recommended with intra-aortic balloon pump (IABP) to prevent thrombosis and embolization. However, anticoagulation increases the risk of bleeding, particularly in combination with glycoprotein (GP) IIb/IIIa antagonists. Hypothesis We investigated the safety of using GP IIb/IIIa antagonists without heparin after IABP insertion in patients who underwent primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Methods Consecutive patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI), who underwent primary PCI and were treated with GP IIb/IIIa antagonists without concomitant heparin, and in whom IABP was inserted, were followed during hospitalization for thrombotic and hemorrhagic complications. Results Ninety-seven patients were included in this analysis. Glycoprotein IIb/IIIa antagonist treatment duration was 12–24 h in 89% of patients, and IABP duration was up to 48 h in 97% of patients. Three patients (3.1%) developed vascular complications: 1 had a major limb ischemia (long IABP treatment), 1 had a minor limb ischemia, and 1 had a cerebrovascular event (after prolonged resuscitation). All patients were already on heparin at the time of the thrombotic events. The rates of major and minor bleeding complications were 9% and 15.5%, respectively. Conclusions The rate of thrombotic complications is relatively low in post-primary PCI patients with IABP treated with GP IIb/IIIa antagonists without concomitant heparin therapy. Such an approach may reduce the risk of hemorrhagic complications, with low risk of thrombotic complications. Copyright © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Heart Institute, Sheba Medical Center, Tel-Hashomer and Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, IsraelSummaryBackground: Left ventricular apical ballooning, a new syn-drome recently described in Japan, is characterized by chestpain, electrocardiographic changes mimicking acute myocar-dial infarction, and transient apical dyskinesia with normalcoronary arteries. Although several studies have defined theclinical characteristics, the prevalence of this syndrome re-mains unclear. Hypothesis: This study sought to determine the prevalenceof left ventricular apical ballooning syndrome.Methods: From January 2002 to September 2004, clini-cal, echocardiographic, and angiographic data of hospital-ization and follow-up were collected from 638 consecutivepatients referred to our Heart Institute for primary percuta-neous intervention.Results: Thirteen patients (2%) were diagnosed with tran-sient left ventricular apical ballooning. All but one patientwere women, representing a 6% incidence for the female pa-tients with acute myocardial infarction. A triggering factorwas identified in eight. One patient died of cardiogenic shock.Left ventricular systolic function recovered completely within4–5 weeks in the remaining 12 survivors.Conclusion: This syndrome is not uncommon and shouldbe considered particularly in female patients presenting withacute myocardial infarction.Key words: coronary angiography, stress cardiomyopathy,apical ballooning, TakotsuboIntroductionRecent reports, initially from Japan, have described a syndrome characterized by chest pain, electrocardiographic(ECG) changes, transient left ventricular (LV) apical wall mo-tion abnormality, without any significant coronary artery dis-ease. Patients were usually women aged >50 years in whom atriggering event, mostly emotional distress, was identified.This condition has also been termed “Takotsubo-like LV dys-function” because of the peculiar shape seen on left ventricu-logram, which resembles a “tako-tsubo” pot (with a round bot-tom and narrow neck) used for trapping octopuses in Japan.

Polymorphous ventricular tachycardia (PVT) is a unique arrhythmia that may occur during or shortly after acute myocardial ischemia. It is believed that the occurrence of PVT at the time of ischemia is due to differences in the shortening time of the myocardial potentials in the different layers of the myocardium, caused by the heterogenic blood supply at that time. We describe a case of a patient who developed two consecutive episodes of PVT, both induced by ventricular premature beats (VPBs) that occurred during the peak of myocardial ischemia as detected by the ST analyzing system while hospitalized in the intensive coronary care unit. Ann Noninvasive Electrocardiol 2011;16(4):409–411