BACKGROUND Electromechanical discoordination may contribute to long-term pulmonary right ventricular (RV) dysfunction in patients after surgery for congenital heart disease. We sought to evaluate changes in RV function after temporary RV cardiac resynchronization therapy. METHODS AND RESULTS Twenty-five patients aged median 12.0 years after repair of tetralogy of Fallot and similar lesions we...

OBJECTIVES The purpose of this study was to determine the frequency and causes of intermittent and permanent loss of cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) in patients who have undergone the successful implantation of a transvenous defibrillator that delivers CRT (CRT-D). BACKGROUND The causes of loss of CRT have not been described. METHODS The records of 512 patients who underwent an atte...

OBJECTIVES Few studies have evaluated cardiac electrical activation dynamics after cardiac resynchronization therapy. Although this procedure reduces morbidity and mortality in heart failure patients, many approaches attempting to identify the responders have shown that 30% of patients do not attain clinical or functional improvement. This study sought to quantify and characterize the effect of...

BACKGROUND The availability of pacing configurations offered by quadripolar left ventricular leads could improve patients' response to cardiac resynchronization therapy; however, the selection of an optimal setting remains a challenge. Echo-particle imaging velocimetry has shown that regional anomalies of synchrony/synergy of the left ventricle are related to the alteration, reduction, or suppr...

Implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) therapy represents a cornerstone treatment in patients at risk for sudden cardiac death. Indications for ICD therapy have evolved considerably from survivors of sustained ventricular tachycardia or ventricular fibrillation to patients with depressed left ventricular (LV) systolic function (LV ejection fraction (LVEF) \ 30-40%), regardless of prior ve...

AIMS To assess the cost-effectiveness of cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) compared with optimal medical therapy in patients with New York Heart Association (NYHA) II heart failure (HF) or NYHA I with previous HF symptoms. METHODS AND RESULTS A proportion in state model with Monte Carlo simulation was developed to assess the costs, life years and quality-adjusted life year (QALYs) assoc...

Cardiac resynchronization therapy has been one of the major qualitative advances made in the treatment of heart failure in recent decades, and it strongly underlines the relationship between heart mechanics, hemodynamic function, and electrophysiology. Since the 1980s a number of clinical and experimental studies have shown that abnormalities in intraventricular conduction, associated or not wi...

Cardiomyopathy in children with mitochondrial disease. Clinical course and cardiological findings. Eur Heart J 2003;24:280–288. 23. Guenthard J, Wyler F, Fowler B, Baumgartner R. Cardiomyopathy in respiratory chain disorders. Arch Dis Child 1995;72:223–226. 24. Auré K, Ogier de Baulny H, Laforêt P, Jardel C, Eymard B, Lombès A. Chronic progressive ophthalmoplegia with large-scale mtDNA rearrang...

A 69-year-old man with a history of severe nonischemic cardiomyopathy managed with a cardiac resynchronization-defibrillator presented to the outpatient clinic with uncomfortable pulsation over the left upper-abdominal area when lying on his left side. He was hemodynamically stable. When he was recumbent in a left-lateral position, there were visible and palpable contractions of the left upper-...