Can Implantable Devices for Heart Failure Help Assess Risk of Future Adverse Events for Heart Failure...( ICDs monitoring intrathoracic fluid...),Health

ICDs monitoring intrathoracic fluid identify patients at a high risk for

subsequent adverse events in heart failure patients

TORONTO, Sept. 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Today a clinical trial "PARTNERS HF: Multi-Site Program to Access and Review Trending Information and Evaluate Correlation to Symptoms in Patients with Heart Failure," was presented at the 12th Annual Scientific Meeting of the Heart Failure Society of America (HFSA) by Dr. David Whellan, who is an Associate Professor of Medicine, Jefferson Heart Institute, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA. This clinical trial highlighted the results of evaluating the intrathoracic fluid data collected by implantable devices used to treat patients with heart failure as a possible tool to determine subsequent heart failure related adverse events. The scientific meeting began Monday at the Metro Toronto Convention Center in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and also featured new research, advances in treatment, guidelines for care, debates, and late breaking clinical trials.

"This finding could be important to help us better understand how body functions (i.e., excess fluid) effect the progression of heart failure," said Dr. Barry Greenberg, HFSA President, and Professor of Medicine, and Director, Advanced Heart Failure Treatment Program, University of California, San Diego. "Diagnostic measures that would lead to early detection of changes in various parameters could ultimately allow us to intervene at an early time and thus prevent cardiac events from occurring."

This trial enrolled 1,000 patients and followed them for a period of 12 months in order to determine the outcome of diagnostic information obtained from an implantable cardiac defibrillator which measures changes in fluid levels in the thoracic cavity. Low electrical pulses travel across the thorax to measure the level of resistance, changes indicate increasing or decreasing fluid levels. Worsening heart failure is commonly
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