Table 4.

Summary of studies showing the prognostic value of endothelial function in patients with HF.

Source (year)	HF type	Number of study patients	Measure of endothelial function	Follow-up duration	Result	Summary of findings
Paine et al.16	HFrEF	156	FMD and hyperemic flow at brachial artery	5 years	+ /-	Reduced hyperemic flow, but not FMD, was associated with an increased risk of adverse events (aHR = 1.07)
Matsue et al.24	HFpEF	159	RHI	0.8 year	+	Log-transformed RHI was an independent predictor of HF-related events (aHR = 1.44 for a decrease of 0.1)
Akiyama et al.23	HFpEF	321	RHI	1.7 years	+	Baseline RHI was an independent predictor for cardiovascular events (aHR 1.20 for per 0.1 RHI decrease)
Shechter et al.19	HFrEF	82	FMD	1.2 years	+	Adverse cardiovascular events occurred more frequently in patients with low FMD (≤ 4.6%) than those with higher FMD (> 4.6%) (53.6% vs. 19.5%)
Heitzer et al.22	HFrEF	289	FMD	4.8 years	+	Blunted vasodilatory response to Ach was associated with adverse outcome (aHR = 1.06)
Katz et al.18	HFrEF	149	FMD	2.3 years	+	Reduced FMD in the brachial artery was associated with an increased mortality risk (aHR = 1.2 for 1% FMD decrease)
Fischer et al.17	HFrEF/HFpEF	67	FMD	1.9 years	+	Low FMD (< 6.2%) was an independent predictive factor for the occurrence of events (aHR = 1.33)

HF heart failure; HFrEF heart failure with reduced ejection fraction; FMD flow-mediated dilation; aHR adjusted hazard ratio; HFpEF heart failure with preserved ejection fraction; RHI reactive hyperemia index.