Teaching the electrical origins of the electrocardiogram: An introductory physics laboratory for life science students

We present the design, pedagogical logic, and assessment of a laboratory and supporting materials that integrate a clinical academic cardiologist\u27s understanding of the origins of the electrocardiogram (ECG) with a physics educator\u27s insights into how to teach the underlying physics at the introductory level to life science students. In this article, we explain the choices made throughout the design process, connect a more advanced treatment of the physics to our approach, and present our assessment of the curriculum. Before the laboratory, students learn the cellular origins of the electric dipole potential produced by the heart on the body\u27s surface, including a simple physical model for the electrical activity of excitable cells, and learn to interpret the measured voltages of an ECG as probing components of the heart\u27s time-varying electric dipole moment. In the laboratory, students measure their own ECGs and analyze the data accordingly; they animate their data to display their own heart\u27s dipole moment for a single heartbeat. Our results from the assessment of student understanding and attitudes indicate that although students find the content challenging, nearly all students find it at least moderately interesting, and for about a quarter of the students in the course, this lab plays a highly meaningful part in connecting physics to medicine

2007 Focused Update of the ACC/AHA/SCAI 2005 Guideline Update for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention. A Report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Practice Guidelines

"Selected late-breaking clinical trials presented at the 2005 and 2006 annual scientific meetings of the ACC, AHA, and European Society of Cardiology, as well as selected other data, were reviewed by the standing guideline writing committee along with the parent Task Force and other experts to identify those trials and other key data that might impact guideline recommendations. On the basis of the criteria/considerations noted above, recent trial data and other clinical information were considered important enough to prompt a focused update of the ACC/AHA/SCAI 2005 Guideline Update for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (3–13). To provide clinicians with a comprehensive set of data, whenever possible, the exact event rates in various treatment arms of clinical trials are presented to permit calculation of the absolute risk difference (ARD) and number needed to treat (NNT) or harm (NNH); the relative treatment effects are described either as odds ratio (OR), relative risk (RR), or hazard ratio (HR), depending on the format in the original publication. Consult the full-text version or executive summary of the ACC/AHA/SCAI 2005 Guideline Update for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention for policy on clinical areas not covered by the focused update (13a). Individual recommendations updated in this focused update will be incorporated into future revisions and/or updates of the full-text guidelines.

ACC/AHA/SCAI 2005 Guideline Update for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention - Summary article: A report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Practice Guidelines (ACC/AHA/SCAI Writing Committee to Update the 2001 Guidelines for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention)

The American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association/Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (ACC/AHA/SCAI) 2005 Guideline Update for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI) contains changes in the recommendations, along with supporting text. For the purpose of comparison, this summary contains a list of the updated recommendations (middle column) alongside a list of the 2001 recommendations (left column), with each set accompanied by a comment (right column) that provides the rationale for the changes, additions, or deletions (see Table 1). References that support either the 2001 recommendations that have changed or the new or revised recommendations are cited in parentheses at the end of each recommendation or comment. A list of abbreviations is included in the Appendix. The reader is referred to the full-text guideline posted on the World Wide Web sites of the ACC, the AHA, and the SCAI for a more detailed explanation of the changes discussed here. Please note that we have changed the table of contents headings in the 2001 ACC/AHA Guidelines for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention from roman numerals to unique identifying numbers

ACC/AHA/SCAI 2005 guideline update for percutaneous coronary intervention - Summary article: A report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on practice guidelines (ACC/AHA/SCAI Writing Committee to update the 2001 guidelines for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention)

The American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association/Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (ACC/AHA/SCAI) 2005 Guideline Update for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI) contains changes in the recommendations, along with supporting text. For the purpose of comparison, this summary contains a list of the updated recommendations (middle column) alongside a list of the 2001 recommendations (left column), with each set accompanied by a comment (right column) that provides the rationale for the changes, additions, or deletions (see Table 1).References that support either the 2001 recommendations that have changed or the new or revised recommendations are cited in parentheses at the end of each recommendation or comment. A list of abbreviations is included in the Appendix. The reader is referred to the full-text guideline posted on the World Wide Web sites of the ACC, the AHA, and the SCAI for a more detailed explanation of the changes discussed here. Please note that we have changed the table of contents headings in the 2001 ACC/AHA Guidelines for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention from roman numerals to unique identifying numbers

ACC/AHA/SCAI 2005 guideline update for percutaneous coronary intervention: A report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Practice Guidelines (ACC/AHA/SCAI Writing Committee to Update the 2001 Guidelines for Percutaneous Coronary Intervention)

"The ACC/AHA Task Force on Practice Guidelines was formed to gather information and make recommendations about appropriate use of technology for the diagnosis and treatment of patients with cardiovascular disease. Percutaneous coronary interventions (PCIs) are an important group of technologies in this regard. Although initially limited to balloon angioplasty and termed percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA), PCI now includes other new techniques capable of relieving coronary narrowing. Accordingly, in this document, implantation of intracoronary stents and other catheter-based interventions for treating coronary atherosclerosis are considered components of PCI. In this context, PTCA will be used to refer to those studies using only balloon angioplasty, whereas PCI will refer to the broader group of percutaneous techniques. These new technologies have impacted the effectiveness and safety profile initially established for balloon angioplasty. Moreover, additional experience has been gained in the use of adjunctive pharmacological treatment with glycoprotein (GP) IIb/IIIa receptor antagonists and the use of bivalirudin, thienopyridines, and drug-eluting stents (DES). In addition, since publication of the guidelines in 2001, greater experience in the performance of PCI in patients with acute coronary syndromes and in community hospital settings has been gained. In view of these developments, an update of these guidelines e168 Circulation February 21, 2006 is warranted. This document reflects the opinion of the ACC/AHA/SCAI writing committee charged with updating the 2001 guidelines for PCI (1).