Cardiac surgery: the evidence and the business, every weekday.

Coronary surgery, aortic surgery, surgical valve repair and replacement, heart transplantation and mechanical circulatory support, surgical treatment of arrhythmia, and congenital heart surgery. A standing section weighs surgery against catheter-based and medical alternatives, and an industry section follows the device makers, filings and reimbursement decisions that shape the field.

Transcatheter valve therapy has its own sister publication, The Valve Wire. It appears here when it bears directly on a surgical decision.

Cardiac surgeons, perfusionists, cardiac anesthesiologists, residents and fellows, cardiologists who refer to surgery, industry analysts, and engaged patients. The executive summary is written to be readable by a patient. The sections below it are written for clinicians.

• Lead with the conclusion, then the evidence. Every claim links to its source.
• Name the alternative. When a surgical finding has a competing strategy, PCI against CABG, catheter against surgical ablation, endovascular against open aortic repair, the next sentence says what the competing evidence or current guidance says about the same patients.
• Flag limitations where the result is cited. Registry or retrospective design, single center, industry sponsorship, short follow-up and small samples are named inline, not in a footnote.
• Surgical tradition is not evidence. Long-held practice resting on observational data is called out as such.
• Follow the money plainly. When a device, reimbursement or acquisition story bears on a clinical question, we say how.

Findings from NEJM, JAMA, the Lancet, JACC, Circulation and the European Heart Journal lead the summary when they bear on cardiac surgery. Every journal, surgical journals included, is covered at arm’s length from the published record.

The Cardiac Wire is AI-assisted, not AI-replaced. Software gathers each day’s sources: PubMed, journal feeds, preprint servers, ClinicalTrials.gov, FDA and CMS announcements, SEC filings, market data and trade press. Claude, a large language model from Anthropic, drafts the briefing from those sources under a written editorial standard. A second editing pass enforces that standard, and an automated check compares every number in the briefing against the source material. The editor sets the standard and reviews the output.

Language models make mistakes. Primary sources are linked throughout so any claim can be checked. Nothing here is medical advice, and nothing here is investment advice.

The Cardiac Wire takes no industry funding. Stock coverage reports market data and the clinical context around it; it never recommends buying, selling or holding a security.