A recent review of pivotal cancer drug trials suggests that CVD and adverse cardiovascular outcomes are underreported in studies of new cancer therapies, despite an increasing risk of cardiotoxicity in oncological drugs.

Cardio-oncology has emerged as an area of rapid growth in the medical community in recent years, owing in large part to an increasing population of cancer survivors.

The same genetic variants that have been uncovered in patients with two other types of cardiomyopathy are also present in an uncommonly high proportion of people with cancer therapy-induced cardiomyopathy (CCM), researchers reported in Circulation.

Researchers used T2 mapping taken from weekly cardiac MRIs to help identify cardiotoxicity at an early stage, according to results of a pig study published Feb. 18 in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. The findings could help cancer patients at risk of chemo-induced heart failure.

T2 mapping derived from weekly cardiac MRIs helped researchers identify cardiotoxicity at an early and reversible stage, a finding which may have implications for cancer patients at risk of chemotherapy-induced heart failure.

Current conversion ratios may be underestimating the long-term cardiotoxicity of common chemotherapy agents like mitoxantrone and overestimating the cardiovascular risk of anthracyclines like daunorubicin, researchers reported in JAMA Oncology Jan. 31.

Inhibiting a certain class of cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK) proteins could protect cancer patients from chemotherapy-induced heart failure—the second leading cause of death in the demographic after cancer recurrence—according to research published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry.

Women with a history of cardiotoxicity from previous cancer treatments are around 30 percent more likely to experience clinical congestive heart failure (CHF) before, during or after pregnancy, according to research published ahead of print in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.