Archives for January 2023

New ASE Guideline Focuses on Cardiac POCUS in Children

Cardiac point-of-care ultrasound has the potential to improve patient care, but its application to children requires consideration of anatomic and physiologic differences from adult populations, and corresponding technical aspects of performance. This new guideline, Recommendations for Cardiac Point-of-Care Ultrasound in Children, is the product of an American Society of Echocardiography task force composed of representatives from pediatric cardiology, pediatric critical care medicine, pediatric emergency medicine, pediatric anesthesiology, and others, assembled to provide expert guidance.

This diverse group aimed to identify common considerations across disciplines to guide evolution of indications, and to identify common requirements and infrastructure necessary for optimal performance, training, and quality assurance in the practice of cardiac point-of-care ultrasound in children. The recommendations presented are intended to facilitate collaboration among subspecialties and with pediatric echocardiography laboratories by identifying key considerations regarding (1) indications, (2) imaging recommendations, (3) training and competency assessment, and (4) quality assurance. Read more here.

Echo VOL | 12 Issue 1

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Urgent Call to Action – Support ASE Representation on Vital Issues by Joining the AMA!

ASE is working hard to ensure your voice is heard on issues related to legislative matters, regulatory issues, coding and reimbursement. To do so, ASE must maintain the Society’s seat in the American Medical Association (AMA) House of Delegates. To qualify, 25% of ASE’s U.S. physician members must also be members of the AMA.

As a member of the House of Delegates, ASE:

  • Helps sets the legislative and regulatory priorities for the AMA.
  • Has full delegate status which provides ASE with full representation before CPT/RUC.
    • This has contributed to some of ASE’s more recent, substantial advocacy successes.

For more detailed information please read: The ABC’s of Payment for Cardiovascular Ultrasound Services and Why the AMA Matters .

To help ASE reach this critical goal, click here.

We urge you to join the AMA today to help us ensure that echo has a voice!

Webinar: How to Publish in JASE & Plans from the New EIC

January 26, 2023, 6:00 – 7:00 PM ET

Make plans to attend ASE’s next webinar on Thursday, January 26, 2023, 6:00 – 7:00 PM ET. Learn about what the future holds for JASE under the direction of its fourth Editor-in-Chief Patricia A. Pellikka, MD, FASE. The presentation is pre-recorded with a live Q&A session to follow. This webinar does not offer CME, and both members and nonmembers can attend for free.

Register now!

Introducing Critical Care eCASE Series

Register Now for the Live Q&A Session on CASE 1: January 23, 2023, 5:00 PM ET

The new Critical Care eCASE Series is a blended online learning activity that will cover three Critical Care eCASES through March 2023. Each case will focus on application of echocardiography and general point of care ultrasound (POCUS), to help diagnose a critically ill patient’s physiologic derangement and how serial examinations help with therapeutic management.

The first Q&A Live Session on CASE 1 will be held online on January 23 at 5:00 PM ET. It will focus on a patient with large pericardial effusion but no echocardiographic evidence of tamponade. The patient, however, had signs and symptoms of tamponade and also had renal failure and pre-existing pulmonary hypertension. The case will discuss the management of this patient.

Cardiologists, interventionalists, emergency medicine physicians, and cardiovascular sonographers are encouraged to review case presentations and participate in the three upcoming Critical Care eCASE Series Q&A live sessions. The series is free for ASE Members and $45 for nonmembers. Register in the ASE Learning Hub. Earn up to 4.5 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits (pending approval) for participation in the entire three-part series.

January CASE – Special Issue on Echo in Valvular Heart Disease

The first issue in 2023 of CASE, ASE’s open access case reports journal, is now available; this Special Issue on Echo in Valvular Heart Disease and Interventional Echo is a companion to the January JASE focus issue. In one report, Tanuka Datta, MD and colleagues from Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, present two examples of the important role of interventional echocardiography during PFO closures. CASE Editor-in-Chief Dr. Vince Sorrell commented, “This CASE report reiterates the symbiotic relationship that is necessary between the proceduralist and the imaging specialist for successful clinical outcomes. In both cases, the patient had suffered a stroke, and the PFO was associated with a large shunt or an atrial septal aneurysm. The authors provide Journal readers with an excellent overview of PFO morphology and offer a standardized terminology for PFO dimensions that should improve the ability to communicate and enhance the likelihood for more optimal device selection. The CASE includes exceptional, high quality still and moving images as well as an educational table and graphic. If you have ever performed a TEE and found a PFO, you will find this report worth reading (and then keeping in your CASE file for future reference).”

This issue also includes three Echo Valvular Heart Disease reports illustrating various clinical presentations of quadricuspid aortic valve disease and a rare congenital case of unileaflet mitral valve. There are also four articles in the Interventional Echocardiography section demonstrating the value of TEE guidance in multiple scenarios and two novel transcatheter procedures. Dr. Sorrell’s editorial, “Best CASE Scenario,” provides an update on the overall state of CASE, highlighting the continued growth of the Journal, a focus on engaging sonographers, and other developments over the past year.

Also, check out the newest Sonographer Sound-Off (SSO) on the CASE Homepage, an interactive feature that provides an opportunity for sonographers to share tips and tricks they have learned in everyday practice. Congratulations to María Elena Sánchez, MD, Trinidad Mitre Institute, Roxana Ratto, MD, Cardiology Offices Doctor T. Padilla, and Mariana Corneli, MD, Institute of Cardiology La Plata, all in Buenos Aires, Argentina, for serving in the role of Sonographer and supplying the images and text for this SSO.

We hope this issue starts your new year off with a bang!

Announcing ASE’s 2023 Award Winners

ASE is proud to support the cardiovascular ultrasound community through recognition of outstanding service, research, and training. We are happy to announce and congratulate the ASE 2023 Award Winners! These recipients will be recognized during the 34th Annual ASE Scientific Sessions in National Harbor, Maryland, June 23-26, 2023. These awards are peer-reviewed and were selected by the Awards Committee, chaired by Sherif Nagueh, MD, FASE.

PHYSICIAN LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
Rebecca Hahn, MD, FASE – Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY

 

MERITORIOUS SERVICE AWARD
William Zoghbi, MD, FASE – Houston Methodist Hospital, Houston, TX

 

RICHARD POPP TEACHING AWARD
Cynthia Taub, MD, FASE – Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, Lebanon, NH

 

CARDIOVASCULAR SONOGRAPHER DISTINGUISHED TEACHER AWARD
Richard Palma, ACS, RCCS, FACVP, FASE – Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC

 

EXCELLENCE IN TEACHING IN PEDIATRICS AWARD
Peter Frommelt, MD, FASE – Children’s Wisconsin/Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI

 

OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN PERIOPERATIVE ECHOCARDIOGRAPHY AWARD
Madhav Swaminathan, MD, MMCi, FASE – Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC

 

ASE MENTORSHIP AWARD
Allan Klein, MD, FASE – Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, OH

Contribute to Echo Magazine

Celebrating One Year as a Monthly Publication

This month marks one year since ASE’s Echo magazine increased its publishing frequency from once or twice a year to monthly. In the past year, we’ve been able to more frequently share communications from the ASE President, ASE Councils and Specialty Interest Groups, and ASE members who have contributed interesting articles or images related to cardiovascular ultrasound that are not research articles/images.

There is so much to share about our vital and essential field, and this year, we once again invite all ASE members to consider writing and submitting an article to share with your fellow members and peers. The submission deadline is the 15th of each month, and you can review the guidelines on formatting, word length, and other general information on ASE’s website. Contact Echo@ASEcho.org with questions about this online, open access publication.

Thank you to all who have submitted articles, and we can’t wait to receive your submissions in 2023!

Act Now to Save on SOTA Registration

There are only a few days left to save on registration for the 35th Annual State-of-the-Art Echocardiography™. Register by Tuesday, January 17, 2023, and save $100!

Join outstanding faculty in sunny Scottsdale, Arizona, and learn the latest on structural heart disease, myocardial and pericardial disease, coronary artery disease, interventional echocardiography, and more! Act fast if you’re interested in participating in the optional preconference Learning Lab (separate fee required). Limited registration spots remain for these intimate sessions!

A total of 31.75 AMA PRA Category 1 credits(pending approval) will be offered for the preconference Learning Lab (15 credits) and main course (16.75 credits). In addition to offering CME credits, this activity has been developed and registered with ACCME to provide MOC, MOC Part 2, and MOCA 2.0 credits in alignment with AMA PRA Category 1 Credit™.

Finally, after registering, we encourage you to book your hotel reservation with the Westin Kierland as soon as possible. The hotel room block will be held until Monday, January 16, 2023, but we expect it will sell out soon. This is a beautiful property offering golf, tennis, pools, and a spa onsite.

January 2023 JASE now available

The role of echocardiography in detection and evaluation of valvular heart disease is a focus topic of the January 2023 JASE, now online. This issue also includes ASE’s newest guideline, “Recommendations for the Use of Echocardiography in the Evaluation of Rheumatic Heart Disease,” from Pandian et al.

January 2023 JASE

Patricia A. Pellikka, MD, FASE, who begins her tenure as JASE Editor-in-Chief with this first issue of 2023, said that she chose the focus topic to coincide with the publication of the guideline, putting out a call for papers last summer. Read Dr. Pellikka’s first Editor’s page, which offers insights on several of the clinical investigations. Editorials, brief research communications, and correspondence in this issue also provide further insights on echocardiography in valvular heart disease. The guideline is the January CME article.

The President’s Message from Stephen H. Little, MD, FASE, shares the history of ASE’s Leadership Academy, which was developed by the Governance Committee “to provide a way to engage our early and mid-career members to develop their leadership skills.” If you missed the prior announcement of those who were recently accepted into the third cohort of the LA, meet them in his message! The continuing education and meeting calendar outlines a multitude of learning options near and far.