ver the past decade, implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) and cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) device platforms have been expanded to include a host of new integrated device-based diagnostic capabilities.1 Parameters such as a sustained drop in intrathoracic impedance, reduced heart rate variability, high resting heart rate, decreased patient activity, prolonged periods of atrial...

1. Tse HF, Siu CW, Lee KL, et al. The incremental benefit of rateadaptive pacing on exercise performance during cardiac resynchronization therapy. J Am Coll Cardiol 2005;46:2292–7. 2. Lau CP. Normal exercise cardiopulmonary physiology and chronotropic incompetence. In: Lau CP, editor. Rate Adaptive Cardiac Pacing: Single and Dual Chamber. Mount Kisco, NY: Futura Publishing, 1993:7–23. 3. Fei L,...

OBJECTIVES The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) in heart failure patients with narrow QRS complex (<120 ms) and evidence of left ventricular (LV) dyssynchrony on tissue Doppler imaging (TDI). BACKGROUND Cardiac resynchronization therapy is beneficial in selected heart failure patients with wide QRS complex (> or =120 ms). Patients wi...

The aim of transplant assessment programmes is selecting a patient who will benefit from receiving a cardiac transplant. The recipient should be expected to live longer with a better quality of life when compared with continuing on medical (or other non-transplant) therapy. Until the mid1990s, the management of heart failure comprised angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors (ACE), diuretics, a...