RADIO REPORT
Each week, JAMA, the Journal of the American Medical Association produces a one-minute radio
news package, and makes it available to stations free of charge at www.thejamareport.org
Producers can download mp3 versions of the packages, and are free to edit the pieces and/or use
the actualities as best suits their stations’ needs.
This week’s package, embargoed until:
4:00 p.m. (ET) Tuesday, November 22, 2011 is:
“HEART VALVE REPLACEMENT ASSOCIATED WITH IMPROVED
OUTCOMES FOR PATIENTS WITH ENDOCARDITIS COMPLICATED BY
HEART FAILURE”
Radio script (TRT: 1:00)
November 22, 2011
VO: ENDOCARDITIS IS AN INFECTION THAT DAMAGES THE LINING OF THE HEART AND THE
HEART VALVES. IT CAN OCCUR WHEN BACTERIA OR OTHER ORGANISMS ENTER THE
BLOODSTREAM AND TRAVEL TO THE HEART. A COMPLICATION OF THIS DISEASE IS
HEART FAILURE. A NEW STUDY FINDS THAT HEART VALVE REPLACEMENT SURGERY WAS
ASSOCIATED WITH IMPROVED OUTCOMES FOR PATIENTS WITH ENDOCARDITIS
COMPLICATED BY HEART FAILURE.
“About 60 percent of patients with heart failure do undergo surgery during their initial
hospitalization for endocarditis and often time’s heart failure was very severe in those
patients.”
VO: DR. ANDREW WANG FROM DUKE UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER AND CO-AUTHORS
STUDIED OUTCOMES OF MORE THAN FOUR THOUSAND PATIENTS FROM 28 COUNTRIES
WHO DEVELOPED ENDOCARDITIS. THEY ALSO ASSESSED PATIENTS WHOSE DISEASE
WAS COMPLICATED BY HEART FAILURE.THE STUDY APPEARS IN THIS WEEK’S JAMA,
JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION.
“Patients treated with surgery do better both during their initial hospitalization as well as at
one year and even patients with milder forms of heart failure that some physicians may feel
comfortable treating medically did better with surgery compared to no surgery.”
VO: CATHERINE DOLF, THE JAMA REPORT.