Although clinical cardiology encompasses the full spectrum of heart disease, in order to avoid overlaps with other sections we have reviewed recent developments reported in two substantial subject areas: aortic diseases and hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which are the focus of working groups in the Clinical and Outpatient Cardiology working group of the Spanish Society of Cardiology. In addition, this article contains a critical review of new guidelines for antibiotic prophylaxis against infective endocarditis published by American scientific societies.