In this special episode of The Lancet Pulse, recorded at ESC Congress 2026 in Munich, host Chloe Wilson is joined by colleagues Alexandra Tosun and Flávia Geraldes to share their highlights from the conference. They discuss standout sessions on women's heart health, including a practical talk on building sustainable business plans for women's heart clinics, and dig into new research on statins — from a study linking early statin initiation after type 2 diabetes diagnosis to a lower dementia risk, to the STAREE trial's findings on primary prevention in patients over 70.
Artificial Intelligence was the dominant theme of this year's Congress, so of course they also discuss its growing role in interventional cardiology, the risk that AI tools can replicate biases and inequities present in the data used to train them, and why human oversight remains essential in patient care.
Among the studies discussed in this episode, you can find:
Association between timing of statin treatment after diabetes diagnosis and risk of dementia: a nationwide observational study
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanepe/article/PIIS2666-7762(26)00226-7/fulltext
Ternhamar, Johansen, Nordestgaard, et al
Safety and efficacy of the 0/1 h pathway for myocardial infarction in the emergency department: an international, pragmatic, stepped-wedge, cluster-randomised, controlled trial
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(26)01654-5/fulltext
Boeddinghaus, Bima, Crisanti, et al
The Lancet Pulse is part of the Lancet Group podcast offering.
Editorial team: Chloe Wilson, Ben Abbott, Matthew Gilbert, and Jonathan Pimm
Podcast editing and production: Matteo Simonetti
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