European Heart Journal – Quality of Care and Clinical Outcomes: a new journal for the 21st century

Quality of Care and Clinical Outcomes is the 14th addition to the European Heart Journal 's family of subspecialty journals.1 Its title speaks to the heart of what matters to patients and reflects a shift in cardiological focus away from a past when the emphasis was on disease diagnosis towards a future in which disease outcomes are increasingly taking centre stage.2 It was only in the second half of the last century that drugs became available to modify the progression of cardiovascular diseases and improve patient outcomes by lowering blood pressure and LDL-cholesterol, protecting against coronary heart disease and stroke, reducing the severity of myocardial infarction and its major complications, and slowing the progression of heart failure. To these pharmacological innovations, we can add an exciting range of surgical, interventional, and device strategies that have further benefitted patients with coronary and valvular heart disease and cardiac rhythm disorders, not to mention the huge contribution that strategies to modify lifestyle factors have made to disease development and prognosis. The 21st century cardiologist is spoilt for choice in the treatments that are available and it is important that the choice is made wisely, considering not only the evidence base but also the costs at a time … [↵][1]*Corresponding author: a.d.timmis{at}qmul.ac.uk [1]: #xref-corresp-1-1