News

The Pulmonary Hypertension Association (PHA) is accepting nominations for its Outstanding Member Awards, which recognize individuals who show dedication to the pulmonary hypertension (PH) community. People with PH, their caregivers, friends, and doctors are invited to nominate “outstanding” PHA members for their “volunteer efforts in patient/caregiver support, advocacy,…

People with pulmonary arterial hypertension of unknown cause, or idiopathic disease, who are older, male, or of low socioeconomic status are at higher risk of death, according to a study from Korea. Researchers also found an overall survival rate of more than 50% among newly diagnosed patients. The study,…

Markers of a type of blood cell called a platelet — the blood cells involved in blood clotting after injury — were associated with disease severity and heart dysfunction in children with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) and congenital heart disease (CHD), according to a recent study These findings show…

A new company spin-out from the University of Bath, in the U.K., is developing machine learning technologies that aim to improve the accuracy of a pulmonary hypertension (PH) diagnosis by analyzing routinely acquired images of the lungs. “Using our machine learning based software we can bring the expertise of…

Healthcare providers involved in diagnosing and treating rare diseases believe that increased physician education and collaboration with specialized facilities will have the greatest positive impact on treating these conditions over the next five years, according to results from a 2021 survey. Definitive Healthcare, a healthcare commercial intelligence company, conducted…

Higher blood levels of hepatoma-derived growth factor (HDGF), involved in blood vessel remodeling, associated with greater disease severity and mortality risk in pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) patients in a large biobank study. Based on additional work in a rat model, its researchers suggested these outcomes were due to the factor’s…

Newly revealed biological mechanisms that underlie the development of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) support activating BMPR2, the protein mutated in most familial PAH cases, as a treatment strategy, according to a study that investigated human cells and mouse models. A recent case series showed potential for the BMPR2-activator…

Supplemental long-term oxygen therapy is the only effective treatment for people with pulmonary hypertension (PH) associated with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) who have low blood oxygen, according to a systematic review of studies. Such long-term oxygen treatment “may mildly reduce severity of PH, slow PH progression over time,…

The short-term survival rate of patients with both human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) — dubbed HIV-PAH — is similar to that of people with idiopathic or familial forms of PAH, according to the results of a Spanish study spanning 20 years. Patients with HIV-PAH also…

Patient registries are a hot topic of rare disease research and many organizations are taking advantage of this resource by signing up their patient communities and connecting with researchers. Eric Sid, MD, program officer for the Office of Rare Diseases Research (ORDR), said it is difficult to estimate how…

Maternal and fetal complications are frequent across pulmonary hypertension (PH) groups, with about a third of patients experiencing an uneventful pregnancy, a small single-center study shows. While PH due to left heart disease is often thought to carry a lower risk of pregnancy complications than pulmonary arterial…

Pulmonary hypertension (PH) has a profound impact on the identity and sexuality of the women who live with the disease, a new study reports. The study, “Sexual and Reproductive Health in Women with Pulmonary Hypertension: A Qualitative Study,” was published in Archives of Sexual Behavior. The impact…