“It’s a really exciting time for interventional cardiology as new technologies come to light for valvular heart disease,” says Dr. Olcay Aksoy, an interventional cardiologist at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. “At the Heart Failure Symposium, I will be presenting ‘How to Treat Mitral Regurgitation.’ Mitral regurgitation is a complex problem. The main symptoms are palpitations and shortness of breath. Basically, they are heart failure symptoms. With these symptoms patients not only have a worse quality of life, but they live a shorter life. Until recently, the only option had been surgical, but Mitraclip, a new technology, has been shown to outperform any other medical treatment. This means that patients live longer, feel better, have less hospitalizations and potentially we’re saving some of these patients from heart transplants. The Heart Failure Symposium is critical in that we need to spread the knowledge that these new technologies are available.”