Understanding Heart Failure

Heart failure is a disease in which there are multiple definitions and the concept is adopted arbitrarily by each author, in such a way that the terminology is so confusing. Now the authors of the mega trials in medical treatment of heart failure avoided this confusion and refererd that this disease can be treated and have set to indicate the value of the ejection fraction- <40 or 35%. The main goal of this paper is to promptly revise the concepts of contractility, ventricular function, preload, afterload myocardial oxygen consumption (MVO2), heart failure, compensation mechanisms. These definitions and concepts are based on the original contributions of recognized researchers, in an attempt to clarify the concepts, which was born in the nomination of heart failure, and thus to avoid an erroneous interpretation, always motivated by inadequate simplification of terms, in order to scientifically explain the concept of ventricular function and heart failure.