Active clinical trials for "Heart Failure"

Patients are randomised to receive ongoing optimised device and medical therapy or triple ventricular site resynchronisation. The hypothesis states that patients receiving triple-site resynchronization will exhibit a better response.

This study is investigating whether a series of psychological exercises, called positive psychology, provides benefit to patients who have been hospitalized for heart disease (an 'acute coronary syndrome' or heart failure). In this study, subjects are randomly assigned to complete 8 positive psychology exercises over 8 weeks, or to complete different exercises in control groups. We hypothesize that patients who are assigned to the positive psychology tasks will be able to complete the exercises at a high rate, will feel that the exercises were easy to perform, and will have greater improvements of optimism, anxiety, mood, and health-related quality of life than subjects in the control conditions.

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) responder rate can be improved by 3-dimensional (3D) echo-guided left ventricular (LV) lead placement compared to traditional LV lead placement.

The investigators test the hypothesis that different beta-blockers had a different influence on chemoreceptor response and lung diffusion capacity. Both could influence exercise capacity in normoxic as well as hypoxic conditions.

Superiority of additional Remote Patient Monitoring in patients with CHF In comparison to usual care in terms of: reduction of mortality rate reduction of hospitalizations increasement of patients' quality of life

Heart failure is a clinical syndrome where the heart is unable to pump enough blood to satisfy the organism's metabolic needs. Heart failure has become a major clinical and public health problem with approximately 300,000 Canadians being affected. Atrial fibrillation is a rhythm disorder in which the upper chambers of the heart (the atria) are paralyzed by continuous electrical activity. Some of the continuous chaotic electrical activity in the atria travels to the lower cavities of the heart (the ventricles) causing then to beat irregularly and very rapidly. It is the most frequent cardiac arrhythmia, affecting 5% of individuals 65 years and older and it is associated with an increased risk of stroke. Both conditions (heart failure and atrial fibrillation) often co-exist in the same patient. Heart failure promotes atrial fibrillation and atrial fibrillation aggravates heart failure. The Atrial Fibrillation and Congestive Heart Failure (AF-CHF) trial is investigating whether preservation of normal cardiac rhythm influences mortality and morbidity. The AF-CHF study began in 2001 and 1,378 patients have been enrolled from 123 participating centres, in North America, South America, Europe, and Israel. The results of this trial which are expected in October 2007, will improve decision-making for the physician and will provide useful information to healthcare organizations responsible for the care of heart failure patients.

Medtronic, Inc. is sponsoring the OptiVol® Care Pathway Study, a prospective, randomized, multi-center, post-market clinical trial in the United States. The purpose of this clinical trial is to compare monthly versus quarterly review of Cardiac Compass® Trends with OptiVol for initiation of clinical action. It is hypothesized that monthly review of Cardiac Compass Trends with OptiVol will shorten time to clinical action as compared to quarterly review.

Purpose: The purpose of the study is to examine if treatment with liothyronine increases left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) in patients with stable, chronic heart failure.

Patients who have heart failure and have electrical evidence of delay in the contraction of the left ventricle on an ECG tracing of the heart are eligible for biventricular pacing. Recent work has suggested that patients with heart failure who do not have electrical evidence of conduction delay (normal QRS) may benefit from biventricular pacing. The reliance on ECGs to determine the presence of dyssynchrony is widespread, although the ECG alone is not 100% sensitive and specific. ECG criteria for de-synchrony in heart failure patients are estimated to pick up only 30% of patients with dyssynchrony, and results in patients missing out on a potentially important treatment advance. We would like to study patients with heart failure who have normal ventricular activation on their ECGs to see whether we can predict those patients who will respond to biventricular pacing.

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether an angiotensin II receptor blocker (olmesartan), in addition to conventional treatment, will reduce the mortality and morbidity in hypertensive patients with stable chronic heart failure.