Left Ventricular Assist Device and Resident Cardiac Stem Cells in Heart Failure: Human Heart’s Potential Matter

Heart disease is the leading cause of mortality in Western countries, accounting for 17.3 million deaths per year. The impact of cardiovascular diseases is influenced by the ability to treat and assist patients surviving acute myocardial infarction (AMI), which has resulted in a nearly epidemic of chronic heart failure (HF), with roughly 5.8 million people with this diagnosis and about 500,000 new cases every year in the U.S.A. Irrespective of the etiology and despite the fact that recent advances in medical and surgical treatments of HF have led to better treatments, 50% of patients die within a month after AMI, and 50% of those with severe HF die within a year. From a pathophysiologic point of view the hemodynamic overload generated by AMI imposes mechanical and neurohormonal challenges on cardiac walls, initially triggering compensatory left ventricular hypertrophy, but eventually activating complex biological responses evolving into maladaptive remodeling, untreatable with conventional therapy.