Ivana Štefanková, Eva Goncalvesová, Juraj Fabián
Despite significant progress in conservative, interventional, mechanical assistance and surgical therapy of heart failure the outcome of patients with this diagnosis is still very unfavorable. The most effective way of treatment is heart transplantation providing that patients are correctly indicated for this procedure. Selection of possible candidates is a difficult process as there have not been any simple and absolute criteria for identification of appropriate patients for the intervention so far. The selection depends on the maximum benefit principle regarding symptomatology, functional capacity and surviving after transplantation when compared with the condition before the operation. A complex of markers used for prognosticassessment of severe heart failure is used together with further characteristics important for presumptive quality of life after heart transplantation.