Patients with acute heart failure (HF) assigned the SGLT2 inhibitor empagliflozin saw a greater improvement in HF symptoms, physical limitations and quality of life measures vs. placebo, with benefit seen as early as 15 days, data show.

Presenting new analyses from the EMPULSE trial at the American College of Cardiology Scientific Session, Mikhail Kosiborod, MD, FACC, FAHA, cardiologist at Saint Luke's Mid America Heart Institute and Vice President of Research at Saint Luke's Health System, said patients who received empagliflozin (Jardiance, Boehringer Ingelheim/Eli Lilly) derived benefit regardless of their baseline level of impairment.

"To date, there has been a lack of therapies with compelling benefit on outcomes in patients with acute HF, highlighting a crucial unmet need," Kosiborod said during a featured clinical research presentation. "EMPULSE fills a unique niche in HF trials of SGLT2 inhibitors because it specifically focuses on [patients with] acute HF who have been randomized in the hospital, it includes patients with both reduced and preserved ejection fraction, those with or without diabetes and, importantly, those with de novo or chronic decompensated HF."

Read the full Healio article: Empagliflozin benefits acute HF regardless of baseline impairment: EMPULSE