Heart Failure: A Major Need and a Major Opportunity

While conventional drug therapies have improved survival of patients with congestive heart failure, the disease progresses relentlessly. Over 5 million people in the U.S. carry the diagnosis of heart failure. More than 550,000 new cases of heart failure are diagnosed every year in the U.S., seventy percent of people with heart failure die of the disease within 10 years, and the five-year survival is less than 50 percent.

Heart failure is the only cardiovascular disease that has been increasing rather than decreasing in frequency. Heart failure leads to more than 300,000 deaths each year, 6.5 million annual hospital days and an estimated $35 billion in direct and indirect healthcare expenditures in 2008. Recent advances in understanding the molecular basis of myocardial dysfunction, together with the evolution of safe and efficient gene transfer technology, have placed heart failure within reach of gene-based therapy.

Celladon offers a potential life-line for heart failure patients whose disease is getting worse on the best available medical care. Celladon’s products could dramatically lower that cost of caring for these patients and provide a better quality of life during the terminal stages of the disease.

Links

MYDICAR® 
American Heart Association
Heart Failure Society of America