Ricerc@Sapienza

BACKGROUND: The usefulness of β-blockers in heart failure (HF) patients with permanent atrial fibrillation (AF) has been questioned.

An impaired peak oxygen uptake (V̇O2peak) during a maximal cardiopulmonary exercise test (CPET) has been shown extensively to correlate with a poor prognosis in heart failure (HF) patients. Even, the abovementioned relationship remains effective irrespective of the left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF), a most recent study by Sato showing an unaltered V̇O2peak prognostic power also in the early defined HF with mid-range ejection fraction class (HFmrEF).

Aims: Exercise-derived parameters, specifically peak exercise oxygen uptake (peak VO 2 ) and minute ventilation/carbon dioxide relationship slope (VE/VCO 2 slope), have a pivotal prognostic value in heart failure (HF). It is unknown how the prognostic threshold of peak VO 2 and VE/VCO 2 slope has changed over the last 20 years in parallel with HF prognosis improvement. Methods and results: Data from 6083 HF patients (81% male, age 61 ± 13 years), enrolled in the MECKI score database between 1993 and 2015, were retrospectively analysed.

Anemia is a highly prevalent comorbidity in heart failure (HF) patients and represents both a marker of HF severity and a predictor of poor prognosis.
Anemia is per se associated with impaired exercise performance and functional capacity.
Iron deficiency (ID) is an important comorbidity of HF, but the diagnosis and correction of ID remainlargely unrecognized in the cardiology community.

Heart failure with mid-range ejection fraction represents a heterogeneous and relatively young heart failure category accounting for nearly 20-30% of the overall heart failure population. Due to its complex phenotype, a reliable clinical picture of heart failure with mid-range ejection fraction patients as well as a definite risk stratification are still relevant unsolved issues.

The role of genetic testing over the clinical and functional variables, including data from the cardiopulmonary exercise test (CPET), in the hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) risk stratification remains unclear. A retrospective genotype–phenotype correlation was performed to analyze possible differences between patients with and without likely pathogenic/pathogenic (LP/P) variants.

Background: Heart failure with midrange ejection fraction (HFmrEF) represents a heterogeneous category where phenotype, as well as prognostic assessment, remains still debated. The present study explores a specific HFmrEF subset, namely those who recovered from a reduced EF (rec-HFmrEF) and, particularly, it focuses on the possible additive prognostic role of cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET).

Aims: Ventilation vs. carbon dioxide production (VE/VCO2 ) is among the strongest cardiopulmonary exercise testing prognostic parameters in heart failure (HF). It is usually reported as an absolute value. The current definition of normal VE/VCO2 slope values is inadequate, since it was built from small groups of subjects with a particularly limited number of women and elderly.