Effect of shock wave-facilitated intracoronary cell therapy on LVEF in patients with chronic heart failure: the CELLWAVE randomized clinical trial.

Importance: The modest effects of clinical studies using intracoronary administration of autologous bone marrow-derived mononuclear cells (BMCs) in patients with chronic postinfarction heart failure may be attributed to impaired homing of BMCs to the target area. Extracorporeal shock wave treatment has been experimentally shown to increase homing factors in the target tissue, resulting in enhanced retention of applied BMCs.

Objective: To test the hypothesis that targeted cardiac shock wave pretreatment with subsequent application of BMCs improves recovery of left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) in patients with chronic heart failure.