Chronic kidney disease is associated with decreased exercise capacity and impaired ventilatory efficiency in heart transplantation patients.

Purpose: Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is common after heart transplantation (HTx). This study assessed the influence of CKD on exercise capacity and ventilatory efficiency after HTx.

Methods: This cross-sectional study included 79 HTx patients (age 64 +/- 10 years, 66 men) at 8.

Response of the oxygen uptake efficiency slope to orthotopic heart transplantation: lack of correlation with changes in central hemodynamic parameters and resting lung function.

Background: Recently, a new linear measure of ventilatory response to exercise, the oxygen uptake efficiency slope (OUES), was proposed in the evaluation of heart failure patients. No data are available on the response of the OUES after orthotopic heart transplantation (HTx).

Methods: Thirty patients who underwent HTx between 1999 and 2003 were included in the study.

Cardiac resynchronization therapy delays heart transplantation in patients with end-stage heart failure and mechanical dyssynchrony.

Background: Cardiac dyssynchrony is frequent in advanced heart failure, and cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) may offer an alternative to heart transplantation. We aimed to investigate the impact of CRT on freedom from Tx and death in transplant candidates with end-stage heart failure.

Methods: Over a period of 2 years, 46 consecutive patients with refractory congestive heart failure due to dilated cardiomyopathy were referred for heart transplant evaluation.