ARTICLE SUMMARY:
To diagnose a disease based on a mechanical dysfunction, you need to measure a mechanical parameter, the founders of Cardiosense believe. Cardiosense is out to provide a noninvasive device for measuring rising intracardiac filling pressures, the hallmark of decompensated heart failure, so patients can be treated early enough to keep them out of the hospital.
The management of heart failure still represents one of the greatest unmet needs in medicine. The lifetime risk of heart failure has grown to 24%; almost seven million people in the US have been diagnosed with this structurally degenerative condition of the heart, and many others with early, asymptomatic disease don’t know they have it. From patient to patient, the etiology, symptoms, and progression of the disease vary, but it is as universally true here as it is for other mortal diseases: early intervention can prolong life.
With all the therapeutic advances that have been made in heart failure, there remain two major roadblocks: identifying patients when their disease is still at an early stage, and predicting, in a timely fashion, exacerbations that land known heart failure patients in the hospital, so appropriate interventions can head off those events.
Most heart failure patients are diagnosed in stage C, the second to highest stage of severity, when they experience symptoms or suffer an acute event. For those hospitalized because of symptoms of fluid overload, the odds of further deterioration go up. After the first hospitalization, 25% of patients are likely to be readmitted within 30 days, and the readmission rate at six months is 50%. Each episode of decompensation risks causing more degenerative structural changes.
