BACKGROUND A reduction in skeletal muscle performance measured by handgrip strength is common in heart failure. No trial has investigated the role of cardiac resynchronization therapy, which leads to improvements in cardiac performance, on the function of skeletal muscle in patients with heart failure. METHODS Nineteen patients were recruited, 18 male, age 69 ± 8 years, New York Heart Associa...

A 32-year-old man with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) was admitted to the hospital because of worsening dyspnea and general fatigue. He had received medication therapy for cardiomyopathy with heart failure and home mechanical ventilation for respiratory failure. An electrocardiogram on admission showed intermittent third-degree atrioventricular block. Echocardiography showed global mild left...

ventricular dyssynchrony on dynamic mitral regurgitation in patients with heart failure due to coronary artery disease. Am J Cardiol 2005; 96:1304–1307. 10. Breithardt OA, Sinha AM, Schwammenthal E, Bidaoui N, Markus KU, Franke A, Stellbrink C. Acute effects of cardiac resynchronization therapy on functional mitral regurgitation in advanced systolic heart failure. J Am Coll Cardiol 2003;41:765–...

Background—In heart failure patients with left ventricular dyssynchrony, contractility in delayed segments does not fully contribute to end-systolic function. We quantified this reserve of contraction related to mechanical dyssynchrony to predict response to cardiac resynchronization therapy by the strain delay index, which was defined as the sum of the difference between peak and end-systolic ...

BACKGROUND Response to cardiac resynchronization therapy depends both on dyssynchrony and (regional) contractility. We hypothesized that septal deformation can be used to infer integrated information on dyssynchrony and regional contractility, and thereby predict cardiac resynchronization therapy response. METHODS AND RESULTS In 132 cardiac resynchronization therapy candidates with left bundl...

et al. Impact of viability and scar tissue on response to cardiac resynchronization therapy in ischaemic heart failure patients. Eur Heart J 2007;28:33–41. 36. Chalil S, Stegemann B, Muhyaldeen SA, Khadjooi K, Foley PW, Smith RE et al. Effect of posterolateral left ventricular scar on mortality and morbidity following cardiac resynchronization therapy. Pacing Clin Electrophysiol 2007;30: 1201–9...

Daubert JP, Eldar M, Gold MR, Goldberger JJ, Goldenberg I, Lichstein E, Pitschner H, Rashtian M, Solomon S, Viskin S, Wang P, Moss AJ. Effectiveness of cardiac resynchronization therapy by QRS morphology in the Multicenter Automatic Defibrillator Implantation Trial-Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy (MADIT-CRT). Circulation 2011;123:1061–1072. 14. Fang F, Chan JY, Yip GW, Xie JM, Zhang Q, Fung J...