ARTICLE SUMMARY:
While diuretics act directly on the fluid-overloaded vascular compartment, WhiteSwell believes that during episodes of ADHF, to effectively restore balance, interstitial fluid must be moved out of the congested tissues. The start-up plans to accomplish this with a device called the eLym System, now being studied in a multicenter, prospective single-arm study called DELTA-HF. A companion article to "Innovating Heart Failure: Start-Ups Harness Natural Pathways."
Fluid overload, which usually appears relatively late in the heart failure trajectory, is the bane of heart failure. It kicks off a vicious cycle of kidney fluid retention, venous and tissue congestion, and respiratory distress, which, each year, lands more than a million patients (in the US) in the hospital with a primary diagnosis of acute decompensated heart failure (ADHF).
These ADHF hospitalizations account for the single most expensive component of heart failure care in the US, costing roughly $18 billion each year, a number that will rise steeply in coming years due to an increase in heart failure diagnoses and the fact that hospitalizations beget more hospitalizations.
