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Digital health interventions including telehealth, mobile health, artificial intelligence, big data, robotics, extended reality, computational and high-fidelity bench simulations are an integral part of the path toward precision medicine. Current applications encompass risk factor modification, chronic disease management, clinical decision support, diagnostics interpretation, preprocedural planning, evidence generation, education, and training. Despite the acknowledged potential, their development and implementation have faced several challenges and constraints, meaning few digital health tools have reached daily clinical practice. As a result, the Portuguese Society of Cardiology Study Group on Digital Health set out to outline the main digital health applications, address some of the roadblocks hampering large-scale deployment, and discuss future directions in support of cardiovascular health at large., (Copyright © 2024 Sociedade Portuguesa de Cardiologia. Publicado por Elsevier España, S.L.U. All rights reserved.)

Introduction and Objectives: Rotational atherectomy (RA) is widely used for the management of calcified coronary stenoses. However, there is limited data on its use, trends, and outcomes. We sought to report our twelve-year experience with RA and explore the trends and outcomes of percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) with this device., Methods: Our institutional PCI database was queried to identify all cases of RA-PCI performed between January 2009 and December 2020. We analysed peri-procedural outcomes and major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) during follow-up: cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, and target lesion revascularization., Results: Four hundred ten procedures (2.8% of total PCI volume) in 388 patients were included. Mean age was 72.3±9.3 years, 74.0% were male, 53.6% had diabetes, and 33.8% presented with acute coronary syndrome. There was a significant increase in median SYNTAX score (p trend =0.003) and the proportion of type B2/C lesions (p trend =0.003). Transradial access was preferred (60.0% overall) with a growing trend over time (p trend =0.003). Maximum burr size was <1.75 mm in 88.0% of cases (burr-to-artery ratio of 0.49±0.07). Angiographic success rate was consistently high (96.6% overall). Complications were recorded in 9.0% of procedures, with a temporal decline (p trend =0.029). Clinical follow-up was available for 357 patients (median time of 40 months). At one year, MACE rate was 12.1% with no significant temporal changes., Conclusions: RA-PCI was a safe and effective procedure with a high rate of angiographic success and few complications, particularly in recent years, in line with significant technical improvements. The MACE incidence is acceptable considering the clinical risk and angiographic complexity., (Copyright © 2025 Sociedade Portuguesa de Cardiologia. Publicado por Elsevier España, S.L.U. All rights reserved.)

Competing Interests: Funding Support and Author Disclosures The authors have reported that they have no relationships relevant to the contents of this paper to disclose.

ChatGPT, a language model developed by OpenAI, has been tested in several medical board examinations. This study aims to evaluate the performance of ChatGPT on the Portuguese National Residency Access Examination, a mandatory test for medical residency in Portugal. The study specifically compares the capabilities of ChatGPT versions 3.5 and 4o across five examination editions from 2019 to 2023. A total of 750 multiple-choice questions were submitted to both versions, and their answers were evaluated against the official responses. The findings revealed that ChatGPT 4o significantly outperformed ChatGPT 3.5, with a median examination score of 127 compared to 106 (p = 0.048). Notably, ChatGPT 4o achieved scores within the top 1% in two examination editions and exceeded the median performance of human candidates in all editions. Additionally, ChatGPT 4o's scores were high enough to qualify for any specialty. In conclusion, ChatGPT 4o can be a valuable tool for medical education and decision-making, but human oversight remains essential to ensure safe and accurate clinical practice.

Background: Clinical practice guidelines recommend oral anticoagulation (OAC) for stroke prevention in selected patients with atrial fibrillation (AF). However, some patients still experience thrombo-embolic events despite adequate anticoagulation. The optimal management of these cases remains uncertain, leading to practice pattern variability. We present a series of three cases illustrating the use of left atrial appendage occlusion (LAAO) as an adjunctive stroke prevention strategy in AF patients with recurrent thrombo-embolic events despite adequate anticoagulation., Case Summary: Case one describes an 89-year-old female on apixaban who presented with a thrombus and underwent successful mechanical thrombectomy. Left atrial appendage occlusion was performed, and no subsequent thrombo-embolic events were reported. Case 2 involves a 72-year-old female on full-dose apixaban who experienced recurrent strokes despite adequate anticoagulation. Thrombectomy was performed twice, and complications arose during LAAO. The patient was discharged on warfarin + clopidogrel and remained event-free at the six-month follow-up. Case 3 features an 88-year-old female on rivaroxaban who experienced recurrent cerebral ischaemic events and gastrointestinal bleeding. Left atrial appendage occlusion using an Amplatzer Amulet™ device was successful, and the patient remained event-free at the one-year follow-up., Discussion: This case series emphasizes the complexity of stroke prevention in AF patients and underscores the need for an individualized approach. Incorporating LAAO alongside OAC can provide additional stroke protection for patients with inadequate response to anticoagulation. Further randomized controlled trials are needed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of this approach. In light of the limited evidence available, these cases contribute to the growing body of knowledge on the potential role of LAAO in secondary stroke prevention in AF patients with recurrent thrombo-embolic events despite appropriate anticoagulation., Competing Interests: Conflict of interest: None declared., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society of Cardiology.)