Bedside Doppler echocardiography provides prognostic information on top of major clinical predictors of mortality and routine laboratory testings in patients presenting with ACS.

The quantitative relationship between necrosis transmurality and improvement of regional and global dysfunction after revascularization is complex. Although improvement of recovery of regional mid-myocardial dysfunction after revascularization was observed only for scarring not exceeding 25% transmurality, global dysfunction significantly improved even when more extensive subendocardial scarring was revascularized.

Stress cardiomyopathies have been increasingly reported these last years, especially in women as a transient left ventricular apical ballooning syndrome. We report six cases in whom, in the context of anxious situations, echocardiograms and ventriculographies revealed mid-ventricular akinesis with preservation of apical and basal contractilities with normal coronary arteriography. This "mid-ventricular ballooning heart syndrome " should probably be classified as a new type of heart stress related syndrome.

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To our knowledge, only three previous reports have described the association of right-to-left shunt through a patent foramen ovale and hemidiaphragmatic paralysis. Such association may be underestimated.

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An 80-year-old woman was admitted for a diagnosis of severe pulmonary embolism. A large serpentine thrombus stuck in a patent foramen ovale (PFO) completely resolved without the patient experiencing any manifestation. The right renal artery was the final destination. Thromboaspiration was unsuccessful. Three months later, the patient was diagnosed with a malignant melanoma and metastatic dissemination.

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