Markers Of Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy

Despite the well-recognized benefits of CRT, an unsolved problem is the fact that based on the current selection criteria up to 30 % of patients do not respond to this therapy. Therefore, it is of paramount importance to try to identify more precisely patients who will derive the best benefit of this invasive therapy. Patient selection for CRT should involve a multimodal approach, and new promising tools may help in this difficult process. In this chapter, we will briefly discuss the impact of CRT in the expression of several biomarkers and also their role as predictors of CRT response, namely endothelial progenitor cells, brain natriuretic peptide, inflammatory mediators, biological markers, and renal function.