NCT07118410: ERFOCARD

Resistance Exercise With Blood Flow Restriction by Vascular Occlusion on Myocardial Function in Heart Failure With Reduced Ejection Fraction

Not yet recruiting NA Last updated 12 August 2025

What this trial tests

NA trial testing Application of a vascular restriction device during resistance training in Heart Failure in 38 participants. Not yet recruiting.

Timeline

1 August 2025

Primary endpoint
1 August 2027

1 September 2027

Quick facts

Lead sponsor	Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Nīmes
Phase	NA
Status	Not yet recruiting
Study type	INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation	randomized
Design	parallel
Masking	single
Primary purpose	supportive care
Enrollment	38
Start date	1 August 2025
Primary completion	1 August 2027
Estimated completion	1 September 2027
Sites	1 location across France

Drugs / interventions tested

• Application of a vascular restriction device during resistance training

Conditions studied

• Heart Failure — all drugs for Heart Failure →
• Ventricular Function, Left — all drugs for Ventricular Function, Left →

Sponsor

Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Nīmes

Who can join

Adults 18 to 80, any sex, with Heart Failure or Ventricular Function, Left. Patients with the condition only — healthy volunteers not accepted.

Sponsor's own description

Exercise is essential in cardiac rehabilitation for heart failure patients.Aerobic training and resistance training are both recommended. Resistance training improves muscle mass and strength and also improves the remodeling of cardiac function, thus reducing exercise intolerance in these patients. However, to obtain these adaptations, resistance training must be done at moderate to high intensities, which cannot always be sustained by the most fragile and deconditioned patients, such as those with reduced ejection fraction (Heart failure with reduced Ejection Fraction).

Blood flow restriction (BFR) by vascular occlusion training is an interesting alternative to conventional resistance training for these deconditioned patients. Preclinical and clinical studies have shown that, for low-intensity regimens, resistance training and blood flow restriction by vascular occlusion improves muscle strength and left ventricular function, unlike resistance training alone. Tissue hypoxemia, initiated by vascular occlusion and exacerbated by maintenance of exercise, is a key element in the peripheral adaptations documented in blood flow restriction, triggering a cascade of signaling pathways involving neurohumoral factors in particular, with effects both locally (i.e. striated skeletal muscle) and remotely, on the myocardium among others. The feasibility and safety of blood flow restriction in heart failure patients has been well demonstrated. Left ventricle ejection fraction remains a very global functional index, with poor reproducibility influenced by cardiac load conditions, making it impossible to draw any conclusions as to possible improvements in myocardial function, linked to changes in intrinsic tissue decontractility/relaxation properties. New cardiac imaging techniques like Speckle Tracking Echography have made it possible to assess the effects of blood flow resistance on myocardial function but so far no studies have used these tools to compare the effects of BFR+resistance training and resistance training alone on myocardial function in heart failure patients. It is suggested that resistance training combined with blood flow resistance could further improve cardiac and muscular function compared with resistance training alone, by activating neurohumoral mediators, like certain micro ribonucleic acids.

Publications & conference data

No peer-reviewed publications indexed yet for this trial.