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.

Ultrasonic strain imaging and reconstructive elastography for biological tissue.

Mechanical properties of biological tissue represent important diagnostic information and are of histological and pathological relevance. In order to obtain non-invasively mechanical properties of tissue, we developed a real-time strain imaging system for clinical applications. The output data of this system also allow an inverse elastography approach leading to the spatial distribution of the relative elastic modulus of tissue.